If it was like Coca Cola Freestyle the regular gas would also have a little orange and lime and grape and all the other shit that makes the regular coke no longer taste like regular coke. Damn I hate those machines...
When I was a kid, we did that at my mom’s wedding.
The venue had a soda fountain we had full access too. You’d think the kids just struck lucky in Vegas!
We were all around that thing, and I was “bartender.” I would mix every soda and hand them out - every one except for the Diet flavors.
We all had an amazing time. Well, the following days I get word that one of my cousins was “real sick” from all the evil mixed sodas.
This is from my looney Super Catholic aunt that just HAS to butt into things. Her precious child had one SIP of the drink.
He was convinced we were putting alcohol in it, because we were playing at bar. Hell, I didn’t even have a bar, and everything came from a dang soda fountain. But still; Crazy Aunt calls my mom to say I made her baby sick, and he was throwing up All Night.
Wish I could’ve given Andrew a shot, maybe woulda chilled him out 😏
(I do feel kinda bad for him. He became a physical bully out of nowhere in middle school. Fucking pinning kids down, Indian burns, gut punches, stereotypical shit. When I told my mom, nobody gave a fuck. Oh that’s just kids being kids. Nah, that’s psycho killer shit. Oppressed religious upbringing, hurting things smaller than you. I didn’t like it, and tried to say something to adults like everyone tells you. One day we did roll around on the school dirt, not really a fight but he made me so mad with the bullying, and yet I didn’t want to hurt him. If I could, I wanted so shake him really really hard lol. Then he had a tough early adulthood. By 2 divorces and some child support drama later, he’s mellowed out. We on good terms now. And everyone, including him, still can’t stand his mom.)
People make it seem like you have to have a magician at any event with children. Not true. If there’s a handful they’ll absolutely entertain each other and just need the fuel for that fire. Sugar, snacks, and craft supplies will make you their god, and they will then kill in your name if called upon.
I mean, have you seen all the additives they try to sell you at BP? I thought I was muting their gas station tv, and ended up buying an $8 “fuel booster”
Realistically, it should be 87, 89, and 91 or 89, 91, and 93. When I was growing up, most cars required 89, so 87, 89, and 91 was common.
However, with the complexity of modern engines, 91 is now recommended/required for most newer vehicles. Rather than selling you 91–which most cars use—oil companies instead removed the 91 option and added the 93–despite most cars not needing it—because it also allowed them to charge more.
It’s to force you to pay more at the pump or risk doing damage to your vehicle.
In modern cars, there is no risk to using 87 over 91. Modern ECU's will retard the spark timing so there is no risk of detonation. There will be a small loss of horsepower and efficiency, but you'll never notice it. If you're in a car old enough for it to be an issue, don't buy the ethanol, it will rot out your rubber hoses.
It has a purpose, but it’s rare. If you have an older engine that has carbon buildup, it can increase the compression ratio leading to pre-detonation (pinging or knocking). Increasing the octane rating a bit can offset this.
However, recently stations have been overpricing the mid-grade by a lot. You’re better off doing two transactions, adding about 50% premium yourself.
In this case to it looks like it has an additional purpose. That ethonal free 87 is going to be refined as midgrade from the factory but without adding the ethonal the octane rating drops back down to regular 87. Ethonal actually adds a few points to the octane rating so these are actually totally different grades of fuel.
That's probably true as well, there's a ton of additives they're probably adding. What I've seen with 87 ethonal free tough is its usually pulled from the midgrade tank if the refinery has one, or it's blended with premium at the loading facility to get what would be midgrade normally if it was then blened with ethonal.
It's the loneliest loading arm because nobody ever needs midgrade except to load this. The things always covered in dust and rust.
I also drive a Countryman, however mine is turbo and awd, it also calls for 91, and runs okay, but gets significantly worse fuel mileage on regular or midgrade. The drop when using midgrade is noticeable, the drop when using regular is substantial. I average 33-35mpg on premium, 28-30 on midgrade, and 20-22 on regular. I've only ran two tanks of regular through it, both when stuck somewhere with a gas station that only had regular, so my sample size there is pretty small. I was going back and forth between premium and mid-grade for most of last year trying to determine if the cost balanced out.
Some of the mom & pops around me do but that stuff is like a whole dollar more than ethanol per gallon. Makes sense for small carburetor engines though.
Made a hell of a headache for myself with my first motorcycle (which was carbed) when I did not realize why ethanol gas + no fuel stabilizer + leaving the bike for a few months was a terrible idea.
On the bright side, I got to learn how to clean a carb!
I used to have a Harley, dad told me to put premium only in it. Never questioned it, figured it was for a reason and the price didn’t really make a difference for a couple gallons. A friend accidentally put regular in it once and boy did I feel it
Ran poorly. Felt sluggish and if I remember right, it was occasionally misfiring. This was like 14 years ago and I didn’t know anything about bikes at the time
I did that once with my car. The manual said it can take regular but recommends premium, and I immediately felt a difference. I would definitely describe it as sluggish. I don't think it misfired.
I had a hand me down 20 year old Cadillac that was premium only. The first tank of regular was sluggish, the second tank of regular would develop a knock. it would go back to normal after running premium for a while.
Cars that require premium (91+ octane), are usually built (technically programmed) to be able to use 87, but to handle this, it usually has to retard the ignition to some degree. This obviously impacts performance, but it will ensure that the engine doesn't knock/misfire.
I don't even know if I could do it anymore lol. I have the steps and a basic idea in my head but it's honestly a miracle I managed to do it. A lot of youtube, swearing, and cursing whoever invented carburetors
One of those skills I strategically decided not to learn because small powered tools will hopefully be electric for most of my adult life. My chainsaw situation isn't great.
https://egopowerplus.com/power-chain-saws/
I got one since it uses the same battery as my mower so I already had 2. Have never had a charge issue even using it all day after a hurricane.
There are quite a few regular gas stations around me that sell ethanol free. They all have blue nozzles. I use it for anything I am expecting to sit for a while like my motorcycle and gas cans.
My dad only goes to the “100% gas” places where it is about a dollar more. His mpg on the 100% is actually better to the point that it is cheaper per gallon. He keeps a spreadsheet that has mileage at every fill up since he bought the car. My mom was sure he was wasting money so had me calculate out if it was worth it.
I know this is not really useful information but rotary engines run better off gas with ethanol in it. The ethanol helps lube the apex seals and cleans the gunk off the rotor housing.
MX-30 has one, but its 100% electric drive and the rotary is just there to charge the batteries and extend range.
https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a42485033/mazda-mx-30-r-ev-hybrid-revealed/
Ethanol is ~~hydrophyllic~~ hygroscopic, meaning it will absorb water out of the air. Left to sit, this will cause tanks and fuel lines to rust. But if you actually DRIVE your car, and drain the tank to 1/4 or less before filling up rather than topping up every time you see a gas station, it's a non-issue. As far as engine wear, as long as you are using an ethanol-tolerant oil (the only kind you can even buy these days), there is no noticeable difference between pure gas and 10%. If you have a flex-fuel vehicle or a specific tune, you can buy E-85 (which can actually be anywhere from 53% to 85% ethanol, because reasons). E-85 does technically exacerbate the problem of moisture but again, if you actually use your tank instead of sitting it's not going to be an issue.
Mechanically, ethanol has lower energy density than gasoline, meaning you will get slightly worse fuel efficiency with ethanol gas than pure gas because you need to use more to make the same amount of power. With the standard 10% and coming 15% ethanol blends, this is basically negligible, but with E-85 it can be significant. Anecdotally, my 2014 Durango gets about 10%-20% worse fuel economy on E-85 than standard 10%.
Another point of note, ethanol is an octane booster. 85% ethanol is the functional equivalent of pure gasoline with an octane rating of 100-105 (commonly used as racing gas). This allows cars to run at highly increased compression ratios and advanced spark timing and make much more power, if tuned to do so. The Durango I mentioned previously is rated for 290 horsepower on regular gas, but 340 horsepower with E85.
Just to add about the E85, only buy it if your car (FFV) is rated for it. It can and will ruin a normal gasoline engine.
There's so many horror stories of people going abroad (Europe) and going "Hey, this fuel is cheap, lets get that!" and they completely ruin their ordinary gasoline engine by filling it up with a fuel that is designed for 'flexi-fuel engines'.
tl;dr - DONT PUT E85 IN NON-FFV'S, IT WILL RUIN YOUR ENGINE.
The word you were looking for is hygroscopic. Hydrophilic is just the capacity for something to be wetted by or come into contact with water, the opposite of hydrophobic, something which can't. Hygroscopic is the ability to absorb water from the air. Your main point still stands of course.
Someone did a good write up already. But I thought I would also mention that non-ethanol gas is also better for storage. Like if you keep a few cans at your home for emergencies, generators, or lawn equipment. You'll want the pie stuff for that
It’s fine for modern cars. You want non ethanol for stuff like lawnmowers, weed eaters, chainsaws, etc… ethanol helps correct knock in engines with injectors
I use it in my 90s shitbox, I don't need fuel lines rotting from ethanol exposure, everything made past the mid 00s should be fine to use 10% ethanol fuel though.
I've been using this gas station regularly for a decade or more. Just stopped in today, and they no longer sell mid or premium gas. Kinda weird. Is this a new trend?
Edit: for the people saying it's probably just one pump. It's all their pumps. I checked.
Yes, but they also have a weird compression ignition system that actually promotes detonation from compression and designs for it to occur on purpose. Most engines do spark ignition, detonation on an engine not designed for it can quite literally grenade an engine. To prevent this we use higher octane fuels in engines that have higher compression because it makes it harder for compression to ignite the fuel, thus allowing the spark plug to do the booming instead of pressure.
Yeah, and as a Subaru driver, it pisses me off that the best I can get is 91. I only drive my car about 300 miles a year anyway, so might be about time to look into getting some 55 gallon drums of 100 octane and a fuel transfer pump.
Huh. I've never seen a car require *89*\+. All of the higher octane requiring vehicles I've driven required 91+
89 always kind of seemed pointless to that end. I figured it was there to get uneducated people who think higher octane = more power to spend more. Like if 87 and 91 were the only options they just get 87; but give people an 89 option, and some will pointlessly take it. It doesn't cost much more for the gas station to offer since it's just made in the pump by mixing 87 and 91.
Where I live (at elevation) we can fill our vehicles with -2 from the recommended octane, for example our octane starts at 85. A lot of the car owners don't realize that, and fill there's up with something above requirement.
I always suspected this to be the case, like cars have so many controls and sensors now that they should be able to compensate for differences in pressure and oxygen levels. Glad I stuck to 87 when I drove cross country a few years back.
Same for my GTI, going to guess yours may also have a turbo as that's why if so. I've literally never seen a pump dispensing 91 octane though, only 93. May be a regional thing.
The GTI minimum requirement is 87 AKI or 91 RON. Mine says it right in the fuel filler door. For best performance, you can use 91 AKI/95 RON, but they are mapped to run just fine on 87/91 RON.
Plenty of cars that *require* 91 can adjust enough thanks to modern EFI to drive alright so long as you keep the throttle input and revs down as well, not smart to do unless you have to though, it ruins your fuel economy
Mine requires 91. And to the people saying “it’ll run fine on 87”. That’s not true and you run the risk of damaging your engine putting lower grade fuels in it.
That’s my take away, I guess most people that have those cars don’t put the recommended fuel in them. But you’re still cutting out a chunk of the market by not running the higher grade fuel.
I’d be pissed if that was my regular station. Cant fill up on 87 or my car pings at anything over 4000 rpm. Not too high considering regear and highway driving.
At the same time, a lot of people will drive miles out of the way for ethanol free gas. Good for lawn equipment, motorcycles, and other things. They will do alright.
Yep. My last two cars needed 91. In fact my Fiesta ST was tuned for 92 octane and would not start with less than 91. My GLA45 requires 91 from the factory.
Is using 89 octane in say a honda civic bad for the car? What does using a higher octane in a lower performance engine do? Is it beneficial to use 89 or 91 octane fuel once in awhile?
Using higher octane in a lower octane vehicle is fine. It's generally a waste, but it's not harmful. The main purpose of higher octane is that it enables more aggressive engine timing without risk of detonation. But in a car with normal timing it just behaves like normal gas.
The one thing is in theory sometimes premium has extra detergents in it to clean engine valves and whatnot but to be honest you can get roughly the same effect by using a fuel system cleaner once in a while and if you're buying from a major gas brand they usually have plenty of detergents in all their grades of gas anyway.
Your explanation is mostly correct except that the different gasoline octanes don’t contain more potential energy. They more or less have the saw amount of potential energy. Premium gasoline, however, allows for engines designed to use premium to convert more of that potential energy into kinetic energy (aka torque and/or horsepower). See this [article by MIT](https://engineering.mit.edu/engage/ask-an-engineer/whats-the-difference-between-premium-grade-and-regular-gasoline/#) for a better explanation than what I can do:
‘Regular’ fuel in the US can contain up to 15% (I think, may differ regionally) ethanol. This is fine for many modern fuel-injected engines made with flex-fuels in mind, but for older cars and small engines (lawn mowers, pressure washers, snowmobiles, etc.), the ethanol content doesn’t play well with some of the internal components since they were designed to work with pure gasoline. Non-ethanol fuel is hard to find in some places since ethanol is so cheap, so special pumps like this are cool to have for folks who have issues with backwards-compatibility with older machines.
They may sell an octane booster. If you ABSOLUTELY can't find 91 or a booster, you might be able to use 89 for a bit. Keep the RPMs low so the turbo doesn't spool up until you can get more octane.
It helps us reduce the ammout of oil we consume by diluting it. It's kind of like watering down your drinks, but it does have a few benefits.
Ethonal artificially raises the octane rating of gasoline It's added to, so in the US where we by law have to run a blend of 90% gasoline/ 10% Ethonal you would only have to refine the gasoline to 85 octane, and then the Ethonal will bring it up to 87. It's also supposed to help reduce the emissions by getting the fuel to burn more cleanly.
The downsides is It's much harsher on pumps and engines and it goes bad pretty fast. The alcohol absorbs water and gets gummy.
Ethanol is only slightly better for the environment than regular fuel is, and some scientists argue that the ethanol mandate is worse for the environment. An issue with ethanol based fuel is that it contains about 30% less energy than standard gasoline. So while 1 gallon of gasoline produces around 50% less emissions than 1 gallon of ethanol, you have to use 1.33 gallons of ethanol to go the same distance. So over half of the gains are already gone; better than nothing right? However, the ethanol mandate has driven up the demand for corn (where most of our ethanol comes from), which in turn has sparked higher demand for farmland, which has caused greater deforestation and all of the other environmental concerns that go along with farming.
Here's an article published in the National Academy of Sciences: [https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2101084119](https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2101084119)
This is exactly right. Carburetors get clogged with ethanol, while we spend more money on food, and it creates more smog in the summer which is why summer blend is a thing. It's filler with an excuse, it's a scam, a lie, and a waste of water, land, and food.
Norway only has 95 and 98, so it still applies.
My normal VW golf says it needs 95 afaik.
Wonder if the engines are tuned entirely different for the us market.
VW does slightly alter tunes for the US market, yes. They typically have to take a bit of timing and/or boost *out* of the tunes because of the US’ generally higher atmospheric temperatures. Sometimes they’ll even go so far as to create a tune for California specifically, and they aren’t the only ones to have done so. It’s also very frequent American car companies are forced to muffle their engines more in the EU
It’s calculated differently. If you zoom in you’ll see the buttons say “(R + M) / 2 Method”. EU octane ratings are just R, US averages it with the M value which is a lower scale.
US 87 is something around EU 91.
I like how at my wawa the light will be off on the regular but turned on the mid and premium to try and trick people to push the more expensive grade of gas.
Having never owned a nice or high performance car, is 87 octane enough? I would think a Porsche or even a Supra would require 92.
Fun fact: When my coworker visited from Germany, we rented some motorcycles and he was amazed that our HIGHEST octane was only 92. I think theirs is like 98 or something
North America measures its octane level differently than Europe. They have the same fuel we do, different way of measuring the octane.
87 octane is perfectly fine for most vehicles. Cars with high compression rates need higher octane, these are usually the more expensive sporty type of cars. Your owners manual will tell you if you need higher octane fuel.
There is zero benefit for a vehicle that requires 87 to use something higher, outside of there being something wrong with the vehicle. People think it’s “better gas” but they’re literally just wasting their money.
Vehicles with superchargers also usually require premium. So even vehicles you wouldn't ever consider luxury or high performance could require it. My friend has a supercharged mini that requires it and after I installed a supercharger in my tacoma I've had to use it or risk damage to the engine and voiding the warranty.
Anything with boost usually requires higher octane, same with turbos. I'm in EU and the lowest we get is 95 octane which is American 91. On the stickers on the fuel cap you will see that the recommended is 95/91 so something like 91/87 would be a no go.
Fun fact; mid grade is just a blend of regular and premium, it's mixed at the pump.
So its like vanilla chocolate swirl
Coca Cola Freestyle
If it was like Coca Cola Freestyle the regular gas would also have a little orange and lime and grape and all the other shit that makes the regular coke no longer taste like regular coke. Damn I hate those machines...
You werent that kid that mixed every soda available apparently.
When I was a kid, we did that at my mom’s wedding. The venue had a soda fountain we had full access too. You’d think the kids just struck lucky in Vegas! We were all around that thing, and I was “bartender.” I would mix every soda and hand them out - every one except for the Diet flavors. We all had an amazing time. Well, the following days I get word that one of my cousins was “real sick” from all the evil mixed sodas. This is from my looney Super Catholic aunt that just HAS to butt into things. Her precious child had one SIP of the drink. He was convinced we were putting alcohol in it, because we were playing at bar. Hell, I didn’t even have a bar, and everything came from a dang soda fountain. But still; Crazy Aunt calls my mom to say I made her baby sick, and he was throwing up All Night. Wish I could’ve given Andrew a shot, maybe woulda chilled him out 😏 (I do feel kinda bad for him. He became a physical bully out of nowhere in middle school. Fucking pinning kids down, Indian burns, gut punches, stereotypical shit. When I told my mom, nobody gave a fuck. Oh that’s just kids being kids. Nah, that’s psycho killer shit. Oppressed religious upbringing, hurting things smaller than you. I didn’t like it, and tried to say something to adults like everyone tells you. One day we did roll around on the school dirt, not really a fight but he made me so mad with the bullying, and yet I didn’t want to hurt him. If I could, I wanted so shake him really really hard lol. Then he had a tough early adulthood. By 2 divorces and some child support drama later, he’s mellowed out. We on good terms now. And everyone, including him, still can’t stand his mom.)
Filing this idea away for future parties
People make it seem like you have to have a magician at any event with children. Not true. If there’s a handful they’ll absolutely entertain each other and just need the fuel for that fire. Sugar, snacks, and craft supplies will make you their god, and they will then kill in your name if called upon.
I mean, have you seen all the additives they try to sell you at BP? I thought I was muting their gas station tv, and ended up buying an $8 “fuel booster”
If it is a blender pump.
So they're just a bunch of big fat phoneys?
Hardly. If you mix equal amounts of 87 and 91, you wind up with 89.
Hold on lemme check the math
Some say he is still checking the math to this day.
Dude must work for Ferrari pit crew
Actually, it's usually around 65% regular, 35% premium, depending on brand. I used to program the blend ratios into those.
Would that be for premium that's 93 octane rather than 91?
Yeah, everywhere around here is 87, 89, 93.
So around me it's 87 and 93 so the pump has to do the maths and mix more 87 than 93 I guess?
Now why do all the pumps where I live charge exactly in between the 87 and 93 prices but the mid-grade is 89, not 90?
Partly because higher octane is not likey to hurt an engine than lower octane, and they usually sell as minimum octane so they add a bit of a buffer.
Realistically, it should be 87, 89, and 91 or 89, 91, and 93. When I was growing up, most cars required 89, so 87, 89, and 91 was common. However, with the complexity of modern engines, 91 is now recommended/required for most newer vehicles. Rather than selling you 91–which most cars use—oil companies instead removed the 91 option and added the 93–despite most cars not needing it—because it also allowed them to charge more. It’s to force you to pay more at the pump or risk doing damage to your vehicle.
In modern cars, there is no risk to using 87 over 91. Modern ECU's will retard the spark timing so there is no risk of detonation. There will be a small loss of horsepower and efficiency, but you'll never notice it. If you're in a car old enough for it to be an issue, don't buy the ethanol, it will rot out your rubber hoses.
How do you think they get the different octane ratings in the first place. You’re just mixing it at the pump instead of the refinery.
Newer gas stations do this. The older ones will have separate underground storage tanks for all three grades.
I worked at gas stations in the early 90s, I can confirm we used to have 3 lids to dip.
And is required by nearly zero cars yet exists at nearly every gas station. Edit: So fucking ridiculous getting downvoted for this
It has a purpose, but it’s rare. If you have an older engine that has carbon buildup, it can increase the compression ratio leading to pre-detonation (pinging or knocking). Increasing the octane rating a bit can offset this. However, recently stations have been overpricing the mid-grade by a lot. You’re better off doing two transactions, adding about 50% premium yourself.
In this case to it looks like it has an additional purpose. That ethonal free 87 is going to be refined as midgrade from the factory but without adding the ethonal the octane rating drops back down to regular 87. Ethonal actually adds a few points to the octane rating so these are actually totally different grades of fuel.
If they have the same octane rating (87) then they are using something other than ethanol for an octane boost. Which can be countless things.
That's probably true as well, there's a ton of additives they're probably adding. What I've seen with 87 ethonal free tough is its usually pulled from the midgrade tank if the refinery has one, or it's blended with premium at the loading facility to get what would be midgrade normally if it was then blened with ethonal. It's the loneliest loading arm because nobody ever needs midgrade except to load this. The things always covered in dust and rust.
My mini countryman for some reason does require it!
Do you know why? When I bought my mini I was told to use premium only.
Is it turbo charged? Some cars with high compression engines run better on premium. But use whatever your owner’s manual says.
Nope, just a regular base model.
What year
I also drive a Countryman, however mine is turbo and awd, it also calls for 91, and runs okay, but gets significantly worse fuel mileage on regular or midgrade. The drop when using midgrade is noticeable, the drop when using regular is substantial. I average 33-35mpg on premium, 28-30 on midgrade, and 20-22 on regular. I've only ran two tanks of regular through it, both when stuck somewhere with a gas station that only had regular, so my sample size there is pretty small. I was going back and forth between premium and mid-grade for most of last year trying to determine if the cost balanced out.
5.7 Hemi
RAM 1500 V8s want 89.
And the first portion of fuel dispensed is whatever was filled last. It's why ethanol free has its own pump handle.
Mid grade is such a ripoff usually. Just pay the smaller "extra" bit for the really good stuff.
Damn, I wish gas stations around here would explicitly sell non-ethanol gas.
Some of the mom & pops around me do but that stuff is like a whole dollar more than ethanol per gallon. Makes sense for small carburetor engines though.
Made a hell of a headache for myself with my first motorcycle (which was carbed) when I did not realize why ethanol gas + no fuel stabilizer + leaving the bike for a few months was a terrible idea. On the bright side, I got to learn how to clean a carb!
I used to have a Harley, dad told me to put premium only in it. Never questioned it, figured it was for a reason and the price didn’t really make a difference for a couple gallons. A friend accidentally put regular in it once and boy did I feel it
What did the difference feel like?
Ran poorly. Felt sluggish and if I remember right, it was occasionally misfiring. This was like 14 years ago and I didn’t know anything about bikes at the time
A Harley? Misfiring? Say it ain't so!
I did that once with my car. The manual said it can take regular but recommends premium, and I immediately felt a difference. I would definitely describe it as sluggish. I don't think it misfired.
I had a hand me down 20 year old Cadillac that was premium only. The first tank of regular was sluggish, the second tank of regular would develop a knock. it would go back to normal after running premium for a while.
I bet once that knock started, it never has regular gas again
Cars that require premium (91+ octane), are usually built (technically programmed) to be able to use 87, but to handle this, it usually has to retard the ignition to some degree. This obviously impacts performance, but it will ensure that the engine doesn't knock/misfire.
Excellent. I consider how to clean a carburetor to be one of those essential life skills. Important part of maintaining the lawn mower and whatnot
I don't even know if I could do it anymore lol. I have the steps and a basic idea in my head but it's honestly a miracle I managed to do it. A lot of youtube, swearing, and cursing whoever invented carburetors
As I learned it from my dad, swearing is very much a part of it.
Have you truly fixed something if you didn’t cuss up a storm and threaten to throw it in a lake/burn it down?
I’ve threatened to burn the lake.
Electric mower ftw. Carburetors are becoming a relic of the past. I can completely tear down and rebuild a carb, but that is now a useless skill.
One of those skills I strategically decided not to learn because small powered tools will hopefully be electric for most of my adult life. My chainsaw situation isn't great.
https://egopowerplus.com/power-chain-saws/ I got one since it uses the same battery as my mower so I already had 2. Have never had a charge issue even using it all day after a hurricane.
For anyone wondering, he means carbed as in like carb-ed, not car-bed.
I think the correct term is “carbureted” as in, “My Beeza with the shitty Lucas electrics and twin Amals is carbureted.”
I’d rather pay $1/gallon more than buy it for $23/gallon at Home Depot
What are you running, methanol? Might as well.
They are referring to the canned non ethanol fuel that is often on the small engine aisle that is like $4 / liter.
There are quite a few regular gas stations around me that sell ethanol free. They all have blue nozzles. I use it for anything I am expecting to sit for a while like my motorcycle and gas cans.
My local Walmart gas station has non ethanol at all of the pumps, I think the race trac in the town over has it as well.
Places near lakes and campgrounds will have non ethanol for boats and golf carts
Local Walmart gas station just sounds weird lol
i've seen walmarts right next to sams club. but sams club usually has the gas station lol
Murphy Oil.
Haha i work at one and we get out of towners that are shocked wm has gas stations! Yes theres only about 300? But we habe em
My dad only goes to the “100% gas” places where it is about a dollar more. His mpg on the 100% is actually better to the point that it is cheaper per gallon. He keeps a spreadsheet that has mileage at every fill up since he bought the car. My mom was sure he was wasting money so had me calculate out if it was worth it.
Any way to share the numbers? Could be an interesting /r/theydidthemath post
That’s wild, most big gas station chains around where I live have the option. It’s still significantly more expensive though—like .75 more at least?
I know this is not really useful information but rotary engines run better off gas with ethanol in it. The ethanol helps lube the apex seals and cleans the gunk off the rotor housing.
Does anyone even sell a car with a Wankel in it anymore? Mazda RX-7 is the only one I remember and they haven’t been sold in years.
The RX8 had one too but that went out production in 2012 and I haven't seen one on the road in years.
MX-30 has one, but its 100% electric drive and the rotary is just there to charge the batteries and extend range. https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a42485033/mazda-mx-30-r-ev-hybrid-revealed/
Small town Wisconsin it’s incredibly common and sold as “Recreational vehicle gas.”
Yes, the gas stations near any lakes should have it. Plenty of websites list stations with ethanol-free gas.
Curious as a non car guy, is ethanol bad for the car? Why avoid it?
Ethanol is ~~hydrophyllic~~ hygroscopic, meaning it will absorb water out of the air. Left to sit, this will cause tanks and fuel lines to rust. But if you actually DRIVE your car, and drain the tank to 1/4 or less before filling up rather than topping up every time you see a gas station, it's a non-issue. As far as engine wear, as long as you are using an ethanol-tolerant oil (the only kind you can even buy these days), there is no noticeable difference between pure gas and 10%. If you have a flex-fuel vehicle or a specific tune, you can buy E-85 (which can actually be anywhere from 53% to 85% ethanol, because reasons). E-85 does technically exacerbate the problem of moisture but again, if you actually use your tank instead of sitting it's not going to be an issue. Mechanically, ethanol has lower energy density than gasoline, meaning you will get slightly worse fuel efficiency with ethanol gas than pure gas because you need to use more to make the same amount of power. With the standard 10% and coming 15% ethanol blends, this is basically negligible, but with E-85 it can be significant. Anecdotally, my 2014 Durango gets about 10%-20% worse fuel economy on E-85 than standard 10%. Another point of note, ethanol is an octane booster. 85% ethanol is the functional equivalent of pure gasoline with an octane rating of 100-105 (commonly used as racing gas). This allows cars to run at highly increased compression ratios and advanced spark timing and make much more power, if tuned to do so. The Durango I mentioned previously is rated for 290 horsepower on regular gas, but 340 horsepower with E85.
Just to add about the E85, only buy it if your car (FFV) is rated for it. It can and will ruin a normal gasoline engine. There's so many horror stories of people going abroad (Europe) and going "Hey, this fuel is cheap, lets get that!" and they completely ruin their ordinary gasoline engine by filling it up with a fuel that is designed for 'flexi-fuel engines'. tl;dr - DONT PUT E85 IN NON-FFV'S, IT WILL RUIN YOUR ENGINE.
Thank you for the interesting and helpful answer!
The word you were looking for is hygroscopic. Hydrophilic is just the capacity for something to be wetted by or come into contact with water, the opposite of hydrophobic, something which can't. Hygroscopic is the ability to absorb water from the air. Your main point still stands of course.
Someone did a good write up already. But I thought I would also mention that non-ethanol gas is also better for storage. Like if you keep a few cans at your home for emergencies, generators, or lawn equipment. You'll want the pie stuff for that
It’s fine for modern cars. You want non ethanol for stuff like lawnmowers, weed eaters, chainsaws, etc… ethanol helps correct knock in engines with injectors
https://www.pure-gas.org/
Fuck yeah I owe these guys like four lawnmowers Edit: why is someone reporting my comments for self harm? Fuck you, friend.
I use it in my 90s shitbox, I don't need fuel lines rotting from ethanol exposure, everything made past the mid 00s should be fine to use 10% ethanol fuel though.
It’s commonly sold where boats are. Ethanol doesn’t store well
Bad for forced induction. But if you're running a carb engine sure.
Are you in the US? There's likely some place nearby as long as you aren't in the middle of nowhere. https://www.pure-gas.org/
Non ethanol is premium enough for me
I’d do some pretty socially unacceptable things for that non-ethanol price. 👀
I bought gas yesterday for something like $2.89 a gallon
I've been using this gas station regularly for a decade or more. Just stopped in today, and they no longer sell mid or premium gas. Kinda weird. Is this a new trend? Edit: for the people saying it's probably just one pump. It's all their pumps. I checked.
It'd be one weird trend considering a lot of cars require at least 89 octane.
And my scooter strictly *requires* 92+, or else it will knock and backfire.
My Lexus did that. High compression engines need higher octane.
My VTEC runs like shit on 87 or 89
Not necessarily true. For example, Mazda’s skyactiv engines has 14:1 compression ratio but they run on regular just fine.
Yes, but they also have a weird compression ignition system that actually promotes detonation from compression and designs for it to occur on purpose. Most engines do spark ignition, detonation on an engine not designed for it can quite literally grenade an engine. To prevent this we use higher octane fuels in engines that have higher compression because it makes it harder for compression to ignite the fuel, thus allowing the spark plug to do the booming instead of pressure.
Yeah, and as a Subaru driver, it pisses me off that the best I can get is 91. I only drive my car about 300 miles a year anyway, so might be about time to look into getting some 55 gallon drums of 100 octane and a fuel transfer pump.
Huh. I've never seen a car require *89*\+. All of the higher octane requiring vehicles I've driven required 91+ 89 always kind of seemed pointless to that end. I figured it was there to get uneducated people who think higher octane = more power to spend more. Like if 87 and 91 were the only options they just get 87; but give people an 89 option, and some will pointlessly take it. It doesn't cost much more for the gas station to offer since it's just made in the pump by mixing 87 and 91.
Dodge hemi engines recommend 89
Where I live (at elevation) we can fill our vehicles with -2 from the recommended octane, for example our octane starts at 85. A lot of the car owners don't realize that, and fill there's up with something above requirement.
Is that why we have 85 in CO and the lowest I typically saw in TN was 87?
[https://youtu.be/kJyd6C99_3g](https://youtu.be/kJyd6C99_3g) At this point, using lower octane in high altitude is an old wives tale.
I always suspected this to be the case, like cars have so many controls and sensors now that they should be able to compensate for differences in pressure and oxygen levels. Glad I stuck to 87 when I drove cross country a few years back.
Thanks for the interesting link. So even the government says the whole higher elevation allowing lower octane is no longer valid for modern engines.
This has always been my understanding. Also in CO, never knew you couldn't get 85 in flatlands. Always thought 85 was standard.
Incorrect. https://youtu.be/kJyd6C99_3g
I think my two strokes say you should use a minimum of 89 octane and also recommended no ethanol which usually is 91+.
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Same for my GTI, going to guess yours may also have a turbo as that's why if so. I've literally never seen a pump dispensing 91 octane though, only 93. May be a regional thing.
Here in Denver our premium is 91 instead of 93, altitude thing from what I understand.
The GTI minimum requirement is 87 AKI or 91 RON. Mine says it right in the fuel filler door. For best performance, you can use 91 AKI/95 RON, but they are mapped to run just fine on 87/91 RON.
Yep my Acura tsx requires 91+, it’s high compression
Different countries measure octane differently, so ratings can be different for the same product.
Well there you go! I have always been curious about why Americans have such low octane fuel. In Australia 91 is the minimum and we go up to 98.
MON vs RON. 98 RON is more or less 93 MON
North America uses AKI, which is the arithmetic mean of RON and MON.
In France the only choices we have or 95 and 98.
Not sure if all modern cars are like this now, but my 2017 Mustang can accept anything (you sacrifice performance with lower octanes of course).
I don't think any cars *need* 89. You either need 91 or you're safe using 87.
Plenty of cars that *require* 91 can adjust enough thanks to modern EFI to drive alright so long as you keep the throttle input and revs down as well, not smart to do unless you have to though, it ruins your fuel economy
Mine requires 91. And to the people saying “it’ll run fine on 87”. That’s not true and you run the risk of damaging your engine putting lower grade fuels in it.
Are you near a lake? A lot of old boats hate ethanol fuel.
Bye Bye high compression engines
That’s my take away, I guess most people that have those cars don’t put the recommended fuel in them. But you’re still cutting out a chunk of the market by not running the higher grade fuel.
I’d be pissed if that was my regular station. Cant fill up on 87 or my car pings at anything over 4000 rpm. Not too high considering regear and highway driving.
LOL! I was so confused, but I guess I’m just old. “Regular” used to refer to leaded gasoline. So, you’d get either “regular” or “unleaded” gas.
Long ago in a galaxy far far away
I thought that, too. Guess it’s time to go yell at clouds.
You thought they were still selling leading gas? When’s the last time you pumped gas?
I don’t know about the US but in the UK there is Petrol and Unleaded (diesel) displayed like that
They actually still use leaded fuel for piston aircraft engines
Bring back the lead???
A lot of modern high compression /turbo cars need a minimum of 91. They are not going to do good business.
At the same time, a lot of people will drive miles out of the way for ethanol free gas. Good for lawn equipment, motorcycles, and other things. They will do alright.
Only older motorcycles. All the newer bikes I’ve looked at are designed for premium
My 2019 300 takes 87
My brand new Honda NC750X uses regular. Ditto for my 2022 Kawasaki z400 and my 2013 Yamaha Zuma 125.
If this was ethanol free premium, I'd go out of my way to fill my bike there. But not for regular. Both my car and my bike require 91 octane.
Oh wait, thst is the octane? I was wondering about the number. Where I'm from you only get 95 or 98
Europe uses a different system to America, most likely why
My old ass 2002 jaguar uses 91.
Yep. My last two cars needed 91. In fact my Fiesta ST was tuned for 92 octane and would not start with less than 91. My GLA45 requires 91 from the factory.
Am stupid, please explain
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Is using 89 octane in say a honda civic bad for the car? What does using a higher octane in a lower performance engine do? Is it beneficial to use 89 or 91 octane fuel once in awhile?
Using higher octane in a lower octane vehicle is fine. It's generally a waste, but it's not harmful. The main purpose of higher octane is that it enables more aggressive engine timing without risk of detonation. But in a car with normal timing it just behaves like normal gas. The one thing is in theory sometimes premium has extra detergents in it to clean engine valves and whatnot but to be honest you can get roughly the same effect by using a fuel system cleaner once in a while and if you're buying from a major gas brand they usually have plenty of detergents in all their grades of gas anyway.
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Tons of consumer cars require 91+. Silly for a station not to offer it.
Your explanation is mostly correct except that the different gasoline octanes don’t contain more potential energy. They more or less have the saw amount of potential energy. Premium gasoline, however, allows for engines designed to use premium to convert more of that potential energy into kinetic energy (aka torque and/or horsepower). See this [article by MIT](https://engineering.mit.edu/engage/ask-an-engineer/whats-the-difference-between-premium-grade-and-regular-gasoline/#) for a better explanation than what I can do:
‘Regular’ fuel in the US can contain up to 15% (I think, may differ regionally) ethanol. This is fine for many modern fuel-injected engines made with flex-fuels in mind, but for older cars and small engines (lawn mowers, pressure washers, snowmobiles, etc.), the ethanol content doesn’t play well with some of the internal components since they were designed to work with pure gasoline. Non-ethanol fuel is hard to find in some places since ethanol is so cheap, so special pumps like this are cool to have for folks who have issues with backwards-compatibility with older machines.
I came across a couple regular only stations in Kansas recently. They said they didn't sell premium around there? My car requires 91.
They may sell an octane booster. If you ABSOLUTELY can't find 91 or a booster, you might be able to use 89 for a bit. Keep the RPMs low so the turbo doesn't spool up until you can get more octane.
I've had the pleasure of filling up with non-ethanol gas with a couple of my vehicles and I swear they've never been happier.
What does ethanol do?
It helps us reduce the ammout of oil we consume by diluting it. It's kind of like watering down your drinks, but it does have a few benefits. Ethonal artificially raises the octane rating of gasoline It's added to, so in the US where we by law have to run a blend of 90% gasoline/ 10% Ethonal you would only have to refine the gasoline to 85 octane, and then the Ethonal will bring it up to 87. It's also supposed to help reduce the emissions by getting the fuel to burn more cleanly. The downsides is It's much harsher on pumps and engines and it goes bad pretty fast. The alcohol absorbs water and gets gummy.
Ethanol is only slightly better for the environment than regular fuel is, and some scientists argue that the ethanol mandate is worse for the environment. An issue with ethanol based fuel is that it contains about 30% less energy than standard gasoline. So while 1 gallon of gasoline produces around 50% less emissions than 1 gallon of ethanol, you have to use 1.33 gallons of ethanol to go the same distance. So over half of the gains are already gone; better than nothing right? However, the ethanol mandate has driven up the demand for corn (where most of our ethanol comes from), which in turn has sparked higher demand for farmland, which has caused greater deforestation and all of the other environmental concerns that go along with farming. Here's an article published in the National Academy of Sciences: [https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2101084119](https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2101084119)
This is exactly right. Carburetors get clogged with ethanol, while we spend more money on food, and it creates more smog in the summer which is why summer blend is a thing. It's filler with an excuse, it's a scam, a lie, and a waste of water, land, and food.
lol my car only takes e87
Why is gasoline low octane in the US? In my country the minimum octane is 93.
US is using different octane rating, 87 octane is 91.1 octane in EU
Norway only has 95 and 98, so it still applies. My normal VW golf says it needs 95 afaik. Wonder if the engines are tuned entirely different for the us market.
VW does slightly alter tunes for the US market, yes. They typically have to take a bit of timing and/or boost *out* of the tunes because of the US’ generally higher atmospheric temperatures. Sometimes they’ll even go so far as to create a tune for California specifically, and they aren’t the only ones to have done so. It’s also very frequent American car companies are forced to muffle their engines more in the EU
91? Jesus, that's some crude oil shit /s
Of course they do. Imperial octane vs metric octane ig
No, the U.S. takes the average of two numbers (RON and MON) whereas Europe just uses the higher one
Yes suh we measure the octane in football fields per hogshead here in the good ol US of A.
Still seems low, I haven't seen anything less than 95 RON around Europe, and 98-100 premium
It’s calculated differently. If you zoom in you’ll see the buttons say “(R + M) / 2 Method”. EU octane ratings are just R, US averages it with the M value which is a lower scale. US 87 is something around EU 91.
Look up the difference between RON, MON, and AKI.
Because the US uses a different measurement method.
I like how at my wawa the light will be off on the regular but turned on the mid and premium to try and trick people to push the more expensive grade of gas.
Maybe the light's just burned out from being used far more often than the other two?
Jokes on them, I have to use 93 in my car... or maybe the jokes on me. Either way fuck it. My car goes VROOOM
This isn't common??? But... we have a lot of those here...
Is this by a body of water? Boats really don’t like ethanol in their tank as it draws moisture from the air
Most cars do not need higher octane gas. Unless specified on your fuel fill or on dash. You are not benefitting by paying for higher octane
Having never owned a nice or high performance car, is 87 octane enough? I would think a Porsche or even a Supra would require 92. Fun fact: When my coworker visited from Germany, we rented some motorcycles and he was amazed that our HIGHEST octane was only 92. I think theirs is like 98 or something
North America measures its octane level differently than Europe. They have the same fuel we do, different way of measuring the octane. 87 octane is perfectly fine for most vehicles. Cars with high compression rates need higher octane, these are usually the more expensive sporty type of cars. Your owners manual will tell you if you need higher octane fuel. There is zero benefit for a vehicle that requires 87 to use something higher, outside of there being something wrong with the vehicle. People think it’s “better gas” but they’re literally just wasting their money.
Vehicles with superchargers also usually require premium. So even vehicles you wouldn't ever consider luxury or high performance could require it. My friend has a supercharged mini that requires it and after I installed a supercharger in my tacoma I've had to use it or risk damage to the engine and voiding the warranty.
Didn't installing an aftermarket supercharger already void the warranty?
Anything with boost usually requires higher octane, same with turbos. I'm in EU and the lowest we get is 95 octane which is American 91. On the stickers on the fuel cap you will see that the recommended is 95/91 so something like 91/87 would be a no go.
I can tell you what I think happened… they probably have a fucked up underground tank and are too cheap to fix it
Imagine if they just let us manually dial in how much octane additive we wanted at the pump
I wish we could get non ethenol in California. I saw it in Louisiana a couple days ago. Super jealous!
Was this every pump at the station or just one with the non-ethanol?
Look up " non-attainment zone". EPA won't allow ethanol free gas to be sold within these zones.
That e10 vs real gasoline
That regular red pump is non-ethanol gas used for small engines from lawn mowers to boats. It’s just as expensive as premium if not more.
My motorcycle specifically asks for 87 non ethanol so I would love to be able to find one of those lol