johneecatt

Here in sunny SoCal we can only get 91 premium. That said - what is the difference between, say Chevron at 3.19 a gal. and Arco (top tier, they say...) at 2.59? I've always been warned not to use Arco, but have on occasion to no ill effect. So what's the difference?

Triple Black

We get Chevron 94 octane with 0 ethanol, but at $1.40 a liter that's about $5.25 a gallon. Count your blessings - you are very lucky to be paying $3.19!

Jaybatl911

Metro Atlanta premium is 93 octane and occasionally I fill up with a tank of 90 octane non-ethanol just keep everything cleaned. I heard there's 100 octane somewhere in north Atlanta but I've yet to find it.

porschemikeandnancy

What I've noticed is that the identical delivery gas tanker trucks seem to service all the stations, including the Arco stations.

I highly doubt that these tankers fill up separately at different places to load up before they depart to refill tanks. I will say that I've never seen a tanker refilling a Shell station so I don't know if they have separate tanker supply trucks.

The only problem I've ever had with gas stations is when we lived in South Florida - we clogged up a fuel filter on my wife's BMW. And I am a gas price shopper - looking for non discount brands at the best price.

Around here, we use Fred Meyer stations - which gives you a 10 cent/gallon discount for every $100 you spend in the store. Given our shopping patterns, I usually get $.20 off/gallon and that helps.

OKB

cheap gas wont have any detergents or additives, good gas like chevron, shell will have all the additives and make the car run cleaner. cheap gas will sludge up the engine, so later you can go pay to have the engine de gunked because it wont run right

Macster

You can try Arco I guess and see how the engine likes it.

I've used Arco only a few times and then quit. The problem I had was the paying. I don't like using a debit card and even if I did not mind using it the fee is considerable. I prefer to use a credit card for my fuel purchases.

OKB makes a good point regarding additives/detergents.

I can tell you detergents make a heck of a difference.

For a while some years back when gasoline prices really spiked and since I drive 60 miles per day for my work commute I started using discount gasoline. Not Arco other brands.

After I moved and about the same time gas prices started coming down discount gasoline stations were no longer as attractive due to prices and convenience. While my commute was about the same I switched to using Shell gasoline.

After a while I noticed a marginal converter didn't generate an error code as often. So that kind of hammered home the additive difference and maybe quality difference between discount and name brand gasolines.

So, I ran Shell almost exclusively in my Boxster (and Turbo) until for cost reasons I switched to Chevon. The Shell station inexplicably raised its prices 10 cents or more per gallon over the prices charged by nearby Chevron and Exxon stations.

After just a few tankfulls of Chevon gasoline the Boxster engine perked up some. The Techron in Cheron gasoline all the difference. I had been a Techron fan before this but only as a once in a great while treatment using a bottle of the stuff added to a tank of gasoline. My experience with using Chevon on a regular basis and then noting the improvement from the Boxster's engine converted me.

Porsche techs I talked to about the change from the Boxster engine after switching to Chevon confirmed my experience was not unique. They all told me they use Chevon gasoline in their cars on a regular basis or use a tankful or two every once in a while for the detergent benefits.

I suspect if you use Arco for a while and then switch to Chevron you'll notice the benefit of Chevon over Arco, but try it and see for yourself.

Alansglide

I'm sold on Techron.
All of my previous cars and SUV's went well north of 200K miles without any problems. I used Chevron in all of them.
I've heard rumor of a station just north of Van Nuys airport that has 94 octane. Have yet to find it but I'll keep looking

DrBrain

I saw the same gasoline truck by "Mohsen" deliver gasoline to Arco and Costco, probably to 76, too. It is widely noted that oil change should be performed after using bottle or two of Techron additive. Does the Techron in the Chevron gasoline contaminate the engine oil, too?

OKB

I used chevron with techron for many years but since shell started the vpower nitro plus
I started using it, they developed it with ferrari
http://www.shell.us/motorist/shell-f...-gasoline.html

porschedog

Top tier rules (Mobil, Sunoco, Texaco, etc) will have hate best blend of additives to the base fuel stock. Fwiw, running non ethanol fuel won't clean your engine any more than running E10. All fuel sold in the US has a corrosion inhibitor and the top tier files will have a decent detergent add pack. Adding fuel treatments that claim tonight corrosion isnktagreat idea, as these components can affect the overall combustibility of the fuel. Even a little degradation can have long term effects such as carbon deposits.
Buying cheap gas is a bad idea. E10 fuel is designed to be used within30 days or so of blending. It begins to degrade after that point as the light ends evaporate. Leaving deposits behind. Most traditionalstabilizerswill also decrease fuel combustibility.

Oil_Slickrick

Here in the UK we have 95 ron (Standard) & 97 ron (Super) unleaded, we are told to run the 996 on 97. Is this a different rating to your 91 rating? it's about 1.79$ per litre

O_Sr

jhbrennan

Different in the US.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octane_rating

VivG

What tier of gasoline does Costco fall into?

alpine003

Top tier. One of the best values out there IMO.

Damn wtf, got suckered into a gas thread. But it is Monday...

mharrison

Does anybody know about the gasoline provided a Kroger grocery store stations? They have a discount offered on gas based on amount spent on groceries, so occasionally seeing $1 off per gallon is nice!

The logo looks like Tom Thumb.