Gas

[Dan_Musicant]

:On Sat, 01 Jan 2005 13:54:29 GMT, Dan_Musicant :wrote: : :>OK, this is off topic for alt.home.repair but I can't resist putting it :>in my crosspost, there's so many canny folks who check out that NG, and :>I know almost all of them drive. :>

:>I was chatting with my auto mechanic the other day and I asked him if he :>thought all gas was pretty much the same these days - an idea I'd been :>encountering. He didn't agree at all. :>

:>Now I guess I should say that I have no connections with the petroleum :>industry of any kind, none in the auto industry either, or any other :>industry associated in any way with gasoline. :>

:>He said his truck was running sluggishly and he put in a tank of 76 high :>octane and could hardly believe the difference it made. Suddenly the :>truck ran smoothly. He said he has a lot of evidence that he and other :>people are getting very significantly better mileage since switching to :>76. I guess that's 76 Union, unless they've changed their name. :>

:>I asked him if he had any experience with their regular gas, and he :>couldn't really say, it seemed. :>

:>I thought I'd throw this out there and see what other people think. :>

:>Myself, I've been using the cheapest regular I can find, usually from :>Costco, or a station I know where they sell pretty cheap if you give :>them cash. I drive less than 2000/year with my two cars, so it isn't a :>giant deal for me, but more mileage and smoother performance would be :>reason enough for me to switch to a recommended brand. :>

:>Dan : : :I found that premium BP, Amoco or Shell makes my car run smooth and :efficiently. If I buy Racetrack or Direct premium gas, my car tends :to run rough and stalls. My car is a 1983 model and it is very :sensitive. Some gas stations will have higher water content which :will cause rough idling, especially during the winter months. I've :heard truckers say that 76 gas is all they buy.

One of my cars is an '83, too. It doesn't run as smoothly as it used to. Thing is, I rarely use that car. It's a Chrysler Town and Country mini-wagon, and I only use it for Home Depot runs for big sheets of plywood and stuff like that. Since I don't do that too frequently, most of the time I use it is to give it a spin just to keep it running OK. My mechanic said I should think about keeping the gas tank topped up to minimize the effect of water condensing from the air in the tank, so I try to keep it pretty near full. I guess I'll try the 76 in that car and see if it runs better. My other car's running better. It's my "every day" car, although I often go a couple of weeks or more without using it!

Dan

[HeatMan]

76, huh?

Around here, the Octane ratings are 87, 98, 91, and sometimes 93...

[willshak]

On 1/2/2005 10:40 AM US(ET), HeatMan took fingers to keys, and typed the following:

76 is not the octane number, it is the brand of gas.

[Eric Tonks]

As a poster above this message said: "Read the pump". Most pumps these days are temperature compensated. That cooler, denser gasoline that you try to get on a cool morning is adjusted at the pump to give you less. If it is hot the pump will compensate and give you a little more. Basically you are getting the same amount no matter what the temperature, as the temperature compensation adjusts the measurements to supposable supply the same amount of energy. You can't win in this game.

[TURTLE]

This is Turtle.

I have been down this road on gas for my company trucks for years and came up with two things to do and you will do fine with fuel.

1) look in the book that come with the auto and get the Octane Rated gas your suppose to be burning. Then when going to gas up Get that octane rated fuel only for your auto is designed to burn that octane fuel. The ratings will be from 86 to 93 octane ratings. Us the one the auto maker say for your computor on the auto is set to burn that octane fuel. I have my truck that are to be burninmg 87 octane fuel. I can put 93 octane fuel and it seems I get worst mileage than with 87 octane fuel. Now the newer model have a sencer to adjust the fuel flow rate to the engine to take care of 93 in a 87 octane car but it will take a 1/2 tank or so for your computor to get use to the higher octane fuel. Pick out the octane rating your auto should be using from the book in the auto and use it.

2) Alway buy your gas at stations that move a lot of fuel to not get old gas sitting in the tanks for too long and start to degrade. Gas will be very poor if left in a tank for 18 months and need rerefining of it.

Tell your Mechanic to go read his book for his auto on what octane fuel he should be burning and he will solve his problem with fuel.

Now 20+ years ago Amoco had White Gas and others has regular leaded gas. This white gas was better but when regulation and unleaded gas come along. The white gas was history. Your Mechanic has these left over thoughts of this era and I still have them but they are just thoughts now a days.

When all else fails Read the instructions.

TURTLE

[TURTLE]

This is Turtle Again.

*** Octane Burns to make the car run good. *** Additive clean and fix problems. *** Yes Gasohol is different but it has a octane rating as the same as not. Alcohol is a very good fuel to burn for if you will check up here on the fuel the cars in the Indy 500 are using. You will find out they use pure Alcohol burning of the fuel. They don't use gas because you can get more power out of Alcohol fuel than unleaded gas. All the high speed or drag racer prefer Pure Alcohol over unleaded gas. So if it is me, Give me 90% Alcohol and 10% gas and get more power and mileage. Now check your book in the auto to see about burning Alcohol fuel and it will tell you about it.

When all else fails , Read the instructions.

TURTLE

[Rod Speed]

Rather pathetic, really.

Rather pathetic, really.

Rather pathetic, really.

Rather pathetic, really.

Pity they are very different engines, and its different alcohol too.

Rather pathetic, really.

Rather pathetic, really.

Pity about the price.

Rather pathetic, really.

Rather pathetic, really.

Rather pathetic, really.

[Don Klipstein]

Actually, alcohol has such a high octane rating that race car engines designed to burn it have a higher compression ratio. Without the higher compression ratio, an engine would actually get less energy from a gallon of alcohol than from a gallon of gasoline. Fuel mileage would actually be a little worse.

Cars often get very slightly less mileage with "gasohol" and other "oxygenated fuel" because these fuels have slightly less chemical energy per gallon.

Some high octane gasolines have alcohol to boost the octane and as a result you may get very slightly less fuel economy and power.

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As for higher octane than the instructions call for being necessary when the engine has a lot of miles on it: This is *sometimes* true. The usual cause is bad spark plugs (replace) or carbon deposits in the engine making detonation occur more easily. Probably less likely if you properly maintain your engine and air filter. But only use higher octane to the extent necessary to eliminate knocking.

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- Don Klipstein ( [e-mail])

[Don Klipstein]

Actually, alcohol has such a high octane rating that race car engines designed to burn it have a higher compression ratio. (Indy cars burn methanol rather than ethanol, but that does not change any other points.) Without the higher compression ratio, an engine would actually get less energy from a gallon of alcohol than from a gallon of gasoline. Fuel mileage would actually be a little worse.

Cars often get very slightly less mileage with "gasohol" and other "oxygenated fuel" because these fuels have slightly less chemical energy per gallon.

Some high octane gasolines have (or at least had several years ago) alcohol to boost the octane and as a result sometimes get/got very slightly less fuel economy and power.

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As for higher octane than the instructions call for being necessary when the engine has a lot of miles on it: This is *sometimes* true. The usual cause is bad spark plugs (replace) or carbon deposits in the engine making detonation occur more easily. Probably less likely if you properly maintain your engine and air filter. But only use higher octane to the extent necessary to eliminate knocking.

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- Don Klipstein ( [e-mail])

[Don Klipstein]

Actually I remember some little scandal several years ago, when gasoline that used to be 60 degrees F when delivered was 76 degrees F when delivered. I know it was something like this, although I may not remember exactly the temperature figures. I believe I saw it in the Philadelphia Inquirer.

I now look at "Cubical Expansion of Liquids", CRC Handbook, page 2284 in the 43rd edition. Pentane is said there to be .001608, and petroleum (density .8467) according to that source gets .000955. I suspect gasoline, although it varies, is probably usually not far from at least one of these - although I suspect lower than the figure for pentane. This is volumetric coefficient per degree C of thermal expansion. Looks like 16 degrees F could make a difference of not far from 1 percent.

The way the newspaper story made it out, it appeared to be a scam by the refinery to deliver less gasoline to gas stations per gallon that they were paying for.

Now, as for temperature variations in an underground tank: I suspect that's substantially less than the variation in air temperature throughout the day. But I don't have any figures for that one. (On an average day in Philadelphia, the early morning low temperature is 9-11 degrees C cooler than the afternoon high temperature, depending on the time of year.)

- Don Klipstein ( [e-mail])

[Edwin Pawlowski]

Sounds more like a reporter with too much time. Did he suggest they deliver gas only in the winter and not the summer?

[Oscar_Lives]

ONLY BUY TOPTIER GAS!

[Oscar_Lives]

Use only top tier gas:

[TURTLE]

This is Turtle.

Rod You must get better to be called a troll and have some original material. Your not original.

TURTLE

[TURTLE]

"Don Klipstein" wrote in message news: [e-mail]...

This is Turtle.

You really confuse me with all the does and don't but I have to revert back to look in the car info book in the glove box and get the octane rating that the auto is to burn and use it. It the fuel you use has alcohol or any other stuff in it but the fuel stated by the manufactor , it make little or no difference in the operation of the auto and if the valve ping. If the engine makes a noise or ping You have a motor malifuction and need to have it looked at. Now if your drag racing or racing the autos I would follow your words as to fuel for high speed driving and super power. In this case you would not want to burn the 87 octane gas and set the injectors , Car computor chip / speed chip , and timing system to burn the 97 or 104 octane fuel for maxium speed and power.

Now I will tell you what happen to the Alcohol being put in the place of fuel in the U.S.A. . We here in the area had a Alcohol manufactoring plant and was making large amounts of alcohol to be used in the cars. I had a friend of mine who was a engineer for them and when they shut the doors on it and we talked about the cause of it closing. He said at the time it cost about $.60 a gallon to get it to the pump and gas was $.60 a gallon at the pump and the oil companys was going along with the 10% mix of alcohol and 90% gas because of shortage. At the time there was some research as to using more alcohol and gas. It was determined that you could run a 50/50 mix alcohol and gas and cars would run fine. At this time there was a push to do away with alcohol because of it was no good to use and really was a bad choice for fuel. One year later the Alcohol manufactoring plant here closed it was running 24 hour a day 7 days a week and customers was buying it faster than they could make it. They had a 6 month back log of orders for it but it was no good at all for fuel for cars. He said if the market ever went with a 50/50 mix in the gas fuel for cars it would cut the oil market share in half and make the oil company take a super hit on profit that it expected to make off the 90% mix fuel. at the 50/50 mix it would kill their business. Then in about 5 years the plant was reopen to make a additive to remove water from the gas tanks and was nothing but the same alcohol the added to the gas to have the 10/90 mix of alcohol. It was open for about a year and the plant had distribitor who was selling the stuff by the gallon to remove the water but people was just buying it to use as fuel at $.60 a gallon and gas had gotten up to $1.00 a gallon. They were using a 50/50 mix and worked fine. You could buy a 5 gal. jug of alcohol for $3.00 and 5 gal. of gas was $5.00 at the pump. The E.P.A. come down on them because of the people doing what they was doing and the plant knew about it by making it in a 5 gal. jug. The E.P.A. made it so hard on them that they closed in about 6 months for them finding everything under the sun wrong with their plant. The plant now is nothing but a bunch of big building in the middle of Soy bean and Rice fields in Franklenton, Louisiana and a warehouse for a oil company to store and work on oil field equipment in it. Everybody was growing corn at the time but went back to Rice and Soy bean after it closed. I even burn some of it and it run fine but when oil speaks Alcohol listens and gets out of the way. Yes the oil company put out all kinds of data that says it was no good at all but like i said before Oil speaks -- Alcohol listens and moves on.

So you will never see the alcohol really come back and compete with oil again.

TURTLE

[Bill Bonde ( ``And the Lamb li]

Excuse me, that's the point of the higher octane. Ethanol has *less* energy per gallon than gasoline. This means that per gallon, you should pay *less* for it. My rule is two or three cents.

[George E. Cawthon]

If they were selling the alcohol at 60 cents and gas was selling for $1.00, it is no wonder they stopped making alcohol. You can make alcohol economically if you use waste products. But you can't grow crops to make alcohol economically because the energy you put into the process is greater than the energy you get out of it. There may be some exception to that, but they are few and far between.

[Dominique Cormann]

Since the ethanol costs more to produce then gasoline, the prices goes up not down.

Whether you think its a good value for what you get is a different matter.

[Bill Bonde ( ``And the Lamb li]

No, I mean if you are buying the product, you should discount it for having ethanol in it because ethanol has less energy per gallon than gasoline. I know it costs more to produce and is available at competitive price points only due to tax subsidies to companies such as ADM.

[Don Klipstein]

(story about ethanol plant able to sell ethanol at 60 cents per gallon, and closing when gas at the pump was $1 per gallon)

One other factor: If the gas station was selling gasoline for $1.00 per gallon, how much of that went to the refinery? I think probably less than

60 cents per gallon, since a major part of the retail cost of gasoline is taxes. 60 cents per gallon is $25.20 per barrel. I somewhat remember that refinery costs were somewhere between a nickel and a dime a gallon (could be a little more now), so for the cost of crude plus refining is 60 cents per gallon, the crude alone would cost about $21-23 per barrel. How much did gas cost at the pump last time crude oil was $21 per barrel? $1.15-$1.20 a gallon? Last time gas was a dollar a gallon, if I remember correctly, crude was about $17-$18 a barrel.

When crude recently fluctuated as high as $50 per barrel to as low as mid 40's, the pump price for regular was about $1.80 to $1.95 per gallon - about 80-90 cents a gallon above the price of crude, and a good chunk of that is taxes.

- Don Klipstein ( [e-mail])