Ethanol vs. Your Engine

[DaSwami_imp]

Our local grocery store fuel island has the lowest price in town but has no detergent additives. You can select a detergent additive when you turn on the pump but the price per gallon goes up to the price of the name brand gas.

Using and selling raw gasoline without additives is perfectly legal of course but it's false economy. All major car makers recommend using Top Tier fuels. Without effective detergents hard carbon deposits start building up on intake and exhaust valves which impede air flow, decrease mileage, and increase emissions. Fuel injectors often stop flowing properly as well. For the last 35 years all automakers building cars in the U.S. have used Chevron fuels exclusively for their 50,000 mile emissions and fuel mileage testing. There are no Chevron stations in Michigan so makers there truck Chevron gas nearly 1000 miles to us it. That should tell drivers a lot.

Chip

Using and selling raw gasoline without additives is perfectly legal of course but it's false economy. All major car makers recommend using Top Tier fuels. Without effective detergents hard carbon deposits start building up on intake and exhaust valves which impede air flow, decrease mileage, and increase emissions. Fuel injectors often stop flowing properly as well. For the last 35 years all automakers building cars in the U.S. have used Chevron fuels exclusively for their 50,000 mile emissions and fuel mileage testing. There are no Chevron stations in Michigan so makers there truck Chevron gas nearly 1000 miles to us it. That should tell drivers a lot.

Chip
Holiday convenience stores in Michigan make a big deal of selling Top Tier branded gasoline. I always thought it was a Holiday trademark; now I see it used at other stations. Must be a tradmark for a mix of detergent additives - Kwik Trip stores in Wisconsin used the same trademark.

There's a lot of cross-pollination of gas brands - In Ohio, Standard of Ohio country, Sohio/BP took their brands off their tank trucks, because so often they'd be filling up the BP station at one point, and then the Gastown station across the street.

If you buy from a reputable vendor (not reservation gas; not Joe's Gas and Tax Service) you'll probably be okay. The only thing I look for, is, first - non-ethanol when I can get it; and second: If it IS advertised as non-ethanol, MAKE SURE IT DOESN'T SHARE A HOSE WITH OTHER GRADES OF GAS. Separate nozzle for the ethanol free.

Now dang, I did not think of that. All my local stations use the same hose. For just filling up a couple of gallons, I can see how that is a big deal, and actually would explain a lot!!!!