i've always seen it at gas stations and autoparts stores and such, and i've seen people mention it a few times on the boards, but never really go into detail.

well my question is, is running octane boost worth it? in case i'm being too vague, i'm talking about the $1.50 bottles at the local Conoco or whatever. Suppose that I'm cheap ( no, no, not me, never.... ), and run 87 octane all the time. is a bottle or two (or more) worth it, or should i have just got 92 octane in the first place?

and what is a realistic estimate of how much higher (than 87) octane would help in the 1/4?

 

That stuff will probably increase the octane rating of a tank by about 0.1. You'd probably get zero performance increase from higher octane fuel.

 

more octane does not equate to more power

 

for a L03 motor?

no. absoultly not. just a waste of money

just put the cheapest gas you can find in there and dont waste your money on "boosters" or cleaners or anything like that.


change your fuel filter atleast once a year or so, and you're fine


after about 100,000 - 150,000 miles, you might want to get your injectors professionally cleaned (off the car.. REAL cleaning,not that on the car crap) or replace them.....

 

Remember, octane is to decrease the chance of detonation. If you aren't detonating then you don't need more octane nor the booster. Be glad you can run 87, and forget that high priced crap.

 

yeah, i've heard that before. even stuff that 'guarantees' a 7-10 point increase?

nope, not actually. check the sig. thank g o d no longer a stock L03 .

i'm not challenging this statement, but if this is true, why run higher octane fuel, besides the obvious reasons (burns cleaner, some motors require it because of thier setup, prevents detonation)?

 

I have been running 93 octane. I had to put gas in to get to the exhaust shop. I put 87 octane in. After I got home, I went to shut it off and the car dieseled for a second. I tried it agian and it did the same thing.

Everything was ok before. I had been running Lt headers with s-tubes and nothing after the s- tubes. I had the rest of the exhaust finished with pipe and dynomax bullets. Do you think it is the gas? To low octane, or maybe water?

Remember I am running a carb now.

 

Yeah, those people who put in 93, or "good gas" as they call it, in a stock car, or stock motor or very dumb. It s not as though 87 octane is bad gas. its just as "clean" if not cleaner. Funny thing about octane ratings.... as the octane goes up, the harder it is to get to ignite. so inreality, they are probably only hurter there gas mileage. 87 octane is a perfectly fine grade of gas. it is not inferior in any way to higher octanes. well, except for the octane rating of course. running 93 octane is going to increase performance at all, not a chance in hell. Unless you modify the motor to the point where it neccesitates it.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by 80smetalfan
[B]yeah, i've heard that before. even stuff that 'guarantees' a 7-10 point increase?


by 7-10 they mean 0.07 to 0.1

 

Those STP injector cleaners help a bit with high millage cars. But yes higher octane will only see a large increase with higher compression cars.

SSBO

 

you run higher octane to stop preignition. you get preignition from more compression and more timing which to equate to more power.

 

see the injector cleaners are like the boosters.... do they help SOME? yes.
do they do what they say on the bottle? they can.


but they just arnt worth the price for what they do. a true injector cleaning envolves flowing the injectors before and after, sonic cleaning, and runing gallon upon gallon of true straight cleaner thru them with the screens out.

while i dont have direct experiance with this company, ive heard alot of good... and he has a nice step by step of what they do.. with pics. http://www.cruzinperformance.com/injsteps.html

 

It ain't worth the bottle in comes in.

 

I love it when people pump 93 into thier cars thinking it will somehow 'clean' the motor. it's not going to happen. there isn't even any octane in the fuel, it's a formula they use to 'equivilate' what it's 'octane' would be equal to. Just look at the pump, it's spelled in out plain algebra.

as for the cheap stuff, I would leave it alone.

cars which run better with 89 and 93 have carbon deposits throughout. they will run better with higher octane, better fuel milage too.

I believe somewhere in the manual it specifies 87 as the proper grade fuel to use in these cars.

I run 87 in my corolla and it gets poor city milage and even diesels now and then, so it's probably time to switch to a higher grade. I don't even know what kind it's supposed to have in it, but at 185k, I'm not complaining.



true, at least for now.

I hope your not talking about me I have a car that is bone stock and requires 93 to run properly. It's all about following instructions I guess, GM would've let ya know if 93 had anykind of benifit.




I saw some threads in the 3si forums talking about 'Sea-foam' as a fuel system/valve cleaner. They seem to think it's the best stuff in the world but you probably wouldn't see me putting that crap in my baby. I've been lucky I guess, because I'm going on 180k with no kinds of engine troubles.

bluegrassz: try the 'water spray cleaning' I kid you not, that will get most of that carbon out. Just get a spray bottle with regular water (distilled is probably best) run the engine at operating temp, undo the air cleaner so you can spray directly into the throttle body/carb, spray the water in (as misty as possible) while reving the engine enough to keep it from stalling. You can see the smoke pour out from the tailpipe as you do this, just do it until you see no more. Don't rev the motor anymore than you need to to keep it running. You will most likley need an oilchange after this too. I actually heard of it from a thread in here, I've done it on a few cars and it works very good. I've never done it with a fuel injected car, only carbed...eachone was a very noticable improvement.

 

Yes, the manuals state that 305/350 TPI engines must run 93+ octane to avoid spark knock.

I've always run 93 octane... sure it's 10c more... but calculate that:

Fill up once a week (I don't drive much ) $1.80 9/10gal = $28 for 15 gal

Now if you get the 87 octane for $1.70, that's about $26

$28/week, 52 weeks = $1456 year

$26/week, 52 weeks = $1352 year

A savings of about $100/year. So, the way I see it, it's really not much of a difference in price, so why not? If it "makes my engine cleaner" or whatever, great. If not, no big loss.


About using octane boosters, I knew it was a crock as soon as Auto Zone sold bottles with pictures of Civics with neons on them.