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Comments
Best Regards,
Shipo
Ethanol and ethyl alcohol are the same chemical, C2H5OH.
Are you thinking you are correcting me on something? I don't understand the purpose of your post.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
"Is alcohol being used in lots of areas now? I thought after he Katrina mess the gov advocated using as much ethanol as possible."
My bad if I got the incorrect impression, but my reading of the above suggests that your language indicated that you were drawing a line between Alcohol and Ethanol. Please accept my apology if I read you incorrectly.
Best Regards,
Shipo
I thought after the Katrina fiasco they encouraged putting alcohol (ethanol) into more and more of the fuel across the country to increase the usage of ethanol (read: improve profit for big companies manufacturing ethanol from corn). I noticed that our pumps used to have a sticker indicating the content COULD contain up to 10% ethanol from some companies who included the ethanol in previous years. Those disappeared. I've not yet tested the name brands for ethanol in our area. I avoid those brands who include ethanol as a technique for reducing quality.
I heard a tanker driver say that only 5 Shell stations used pure gasoline in his delivery area. It used to be Speedway, Clark, and other off brands that had ethanol disclaimers on their pumps in this area of Ohio. The use of ethanol reduced the cost per galloon so these stations sold ethanol gas at a price equal to the regular gasoline and made a higher profit per gallon because the ethanol doesn't pay state tax and maybe federal tax.
I believe the ethanol gasoline gives lower miles per gallon.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
Here in the Boston area we had no ethanol infrastructure for a long time and as such we were allowed to get away with non ethanol fuels until about a year ago. When they hit, both of our cars immediately started returning about 5% fewer miles per gallon. Grrr.
Best Regards,
Shipo
This states that 50% of fuel in US contains alcohol.
governors' conference
This states a minimum amount of renewable fuels (ethanol) that will be used. Maybe this was the required ethanol use that I was recalling. Rather than percent of fuel needing to be alcohol (ethanol) it states a quantity of ethanol to be used.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
An interesting point. None of the New England states sent a representative, not one. Hmmmm...
Best Regards,
Shipo
I noticed that i get better Gas Mileage than from Ethanol Based Gas.
Does anyone agree or disagree?
A few points:
- Ethanol is an blending agent that is used as an oxygenate
- Techron is Chevron's additive package to help keep fuel systems and the upper end of the engine clean
- The two are not mutually exclusive
- If you find fuel that is not an Ethanol blend it is almost a sure bet that your car will get better mileage with it (Techron or no) as compared to when you are running E10 (Techron or no).
Best Regards,
Shipo
Then I suggest switching to chevron/Texaco instead
Keep away from no-brand gas station. I learnt the hard way (from buying bad gas)
Be sure to check tire pressure; also, if you regularly drive at over 70 mph, you aren't going to get the advertised MPG.
However, I would like to use regular gasoline.
I need feedback form other owners who are doing this or may haev done this in the past. Any degradation in engine performance or pinging?
Thanks!
The AKI (Anti Knock Index) of fuels sold in the States and Canada (and Mexico too?) is an average of two different Octane ratings (i.e. (RON + MON) / 2), and as such it isn't actually an octane rating in and of itself.
"So in a nutshell the higher compression of the engine the more likely the fuel is to pre-ignite (burns w/o use of spark plug)."
Ummm, no. The AKI rating of a fuel has virtually nothing to do with pre-ignition as there isn't a single car sold anywhere in North America that will experience pre-ignition on any grade of gasoline sold here. Where the AKI does come into play is in preventing detonation or "knocking" (hence the name) under normal operation.
A few definitions to help you out:
- Detonation: Detonation occurrs when small pockets of end gas (i.e. unburnt pockets of air and fuel) exceed some critical temperature and/or pressure (varies by combustion chamber design, combustion chamber condition, air/fuel mixture and fuel grade) and spontaniously combusts before the flame front reaches said pockets. A key point here is that detonation happens long after (relatively speaking) the spark event.
- Pre-ignition: The spontanious combustion of fuel before the spark event. Pre-ignition will never-EVER occur, regardless of the grade of fuel, unless the engine has a serious problem, and should such a problem exist, no grade of fuel will prevent it from happening and almost instantly destroying the engine.
Other ideas come to mind---such as a faulty coolant temperature sensor.
no matter the formulation, 87 ignites more easily than premium, by definition.
so if BMW recommends 87 as the solution, and it works for you, then i don't see any issue. happy motoring!
It's one thing to use this gas by choice quite another when it is required to get your new engine to start when temperatures dip slightly below freezing. I did not expect a seasonal vehicle.
BMW is not referring to octane but so called changes to the premium fuel additives by manufacturers "after they designed the engine" forcing BMW to "rush to catch up" according to my dealership. No specific manufacturer is mentioned so I'm currently contacting all. So far the response has been that BMW's claim is senseless and BMW has never contacted them. They ask that BMW to do so as gasoline is highly regulated.
If BMW recommends this fuel, let them formalize it in a service bulletin and change their literature re their recommendation of premium fuel for mileage, performance and engine maintenance.
As for 'burning faster', I don't think this is inherent in the 87 fuel---what I think might happen is that the regular fuel will signal the car's computer to retard the ignition timing (giving you less power and performance by the way), and thus, ignition might occur a bit sooner---so in THAT sense it burns, not faster, but sooner, in the combustion chamber.
On the other hand, any fuel with ethanol would burn FASTER.
My two cents.
also iirc, independent of top-tier or bottom-tier gas, it's been decades since there were different additives in different grades of fuel - except for variations required to change octane & maintain the govt-mandated oxygenation.
Clearly BMW has a 'bug' to fix with the vehicle and a TSB may be appropriate if the issue is common.
Owners who prefer to spend more per gallon to get identical winter performance by running premium fuel should be forewarned that the x3 may not be the right vehicle for them.
i wonder if the BMW does better with unoxygenated/minimally-oxygenated 91+ octane? (you may have to drive >500 or >1000 miles to find any, maybe not worth it just to find out .
Your first statement is correct, but not the second. There is no difference that I know of in the ease with which 87 octane gas ignites in the presence of a spark verses 91 octane.
So I don't understand why using 87 octane in the BMW would solve the problem she mentioned. Unless it's related to the winter time formulation of the gas where she lives - which is what I think you were getting at.
so the techs did in fact fix the problem. if not then its gotta be fuelpump or injector issue?
assuming i read correctly that the original problem was actually solved by using the supported 87 octane, it can addressed by adding 4 words to the owners manual:
"premium fuel is recommended, EXCEPT IN FREEZING WEATHER".
?
some time maybe you will encounter non-start situation in frigid weather with whatever engine and if you have lower-octane fuel available, maybe you'll see it work...
(btw, so i see your point correctly that the octane measures the resistance to pressure-induced ignition, not sparked ignition?!)
in any case, i'm wishing to go back to a diesel engine, so looking forward to our ongoing different stylings regarding CETANE . never mind all this octane stuff.
one of the automags years ago (before oxygenated gas became required in USA) put a big v8 crate engine on a bench and tested it with the various octanes, as well as precisely measuring the tiny octane differences in the gasolihe. it was amazing how little difference the octane was, and how little difference in performance actually resulted.
chances are pretty good that someone else with a similar problem will not find regular gas to be a solution.
I suppose it would be fair, at least at this point, to say that using regular gas does not "cure" cold start stalling in an X3, but that it may, under certain circumstances, alleviate it in certain cars?
The bench test with the big V-8 would be meaningless if the engine didn't have computer controls for timing I think, because all they had to do was set the timing to just short of the ping point on regular fuel---and then yeah, sure, using higher octane wouldn't matter much at all. There isn't any more "power" in high octane gas.
anyway, "YMMV" ! speaking of BMWs and fuel types, I've been seeing so many X5d lately! must be nice to drive one of those ....