wallstplyr

Just wanted to confirm that using Plus type of gas (89) would be okay for my 2007 TSX. The manual says to use Premium gas, but my dealership says 89+ would be just fine.

I asked a friend who has owned various luxury sports performance types of cars over the years and he suggests to use Plus since it's practically almost the same as Prem gas, but to use Prem gas every 2 to 3 months to clean out the engine.

Your thoughts/recommendations?

dwest1023

first of all Premium does not provide any additional cleaning. Second, the car was design to run best and cleaner, using what Aura recommends. If you don't mind decrease performances and faster wearing engine, buy all means use what you please.

Vanilla_Gorilla

Is .5 to .10 cents extra a gallon worth your engine life and performance? Worse case scenario: 15 gallons X .10 cents extra a gallon = $1.50.

If you can't afford $1.50, how are you going to afford repairing your engine?

jlukja

and, here we go again .....

https://acurazine.com/forums/showthr...ghlight=octane




Do a search on "octane" and you'll find dozens of threads on this topic.

slammers

I deliberated the same option when we bought the car and I just yielded to what others said in previous posts (and also this one)...

We're talking about a $2.00 difference in a fillup. We forked out the big $$$ to buy the nicer car, we might as well do what it takes to run it properly on the backend.

wallstplyr

LOL, very good point!

wallstplyr

Ok.. putting gas types aside. Premium is the way to go!

NOW, my last question is... does the gas company (or supplier/carrier whatever you put it) make all the difference? I hear that Shell and Cheveron has the best premium gas available. What about Exxon, Wawa (I'm out in the east coast), BP, etc. OR even localities (i.e., The Bettie Gray South Bend Gas Fill Er Up Station)???

visuelz

I'm not sure why but the Shell in my area seems to give me lower mpg than the Mobil that's only a block away.

TSXnTEX

wawa?!? Thats a gas station? Thats a funny ass name. "my acura needs some WaWa!!"

DuckDodgers

http://www.toptiergas.com/

The best gas to use is any of the top tier brands. Currently, per the linked page retailers list, they are:

TOP TIER Gasoline Retailers:

QuikTrip
Chevron
Conoco
Phillips
76
Shell
Entec Stations
MFA Oil Company
Kwik Trip/Kwik Star
The Somerset Refinery, Inc.
Chevron-Canada
Aloha Petroleum
Tri-Par Oil Company
Shell-Canada
Texaco
Petro-Canada
Sunoco-Canada

So, if you are really concerned, these as the best brands to buy as they wouldn't risk their top tier status or allow their retailers to do so either. Personally, I just chunk in a bottle of Techron every 6 months or so...and never patronize the smaller stations that raise any questions in my mind.

visuelz

Hmm...I can't believe ExxonMobil isn't on it.

Vanilla_Gorilla

Glad i could help!

EuRTSX

I refuse to put anything under 93 in my TSX.

1Louder

My only add is to look out for places that sell an Ethanol blend (like 10% ethanol). I have no data on what it may do mechanically (if anything), but it will lower your MPG.

My wife also filled a tank with regular unleaded (87), thinking she was helping me, and I got -2 MPG as well.

Always use what the manual says.

DNvCross

dang... none of those retailers are available near me at Virginia Tech. I've only got BP and Food Lion

Simba91102

No choice here in Mass., it's all 10% ethanol blend (I'm sure at least partly because the geniuses here that adopted CA's pollution control regs. a number of years ago).

CGTSX07

I've found most gas stations I go to have this 10% ethanol blend as well (I usually stick to Chevron though)

Vanilla_Gorilla

Lucky you! Us Californians only get 91.

RkFast

What about Valero? They are a National brand, based in Houston. But they are always cheaper, which leads me to beleive their quality isnt the best. I ran it in my Teg for a long time with no issues.

ts521

Let's say I've been routinely using 91 then make the switch to 93 over a long period. Would I experience the 'full benefit' of the upgrade?

1Louder

More octane does not equal more performance. It's simply an additive that prevents gas from exploding under pressure before being ignited. High-compression engines need higher octane to avoid this. The engine is high performance, not the gas. Therefore, I'd have to wonder if there is any difference betweeen 91 and 93, other than in the mind of the driver.

rb1

I suppose this is technically true, but consider that:

1. At least in the "old days", you could just advance the engine timing and achieve some performance gains from using high octane gas.

2. In a car designed for high octane gas, using less than the recommended octane level results in reduced performance. Thus, in such a car, using higher octane gas, up to the recommended level, does result in more performance than using lower octane gas.

If a car isn't pinging, there's clearly no benefit to exceeding the recommended octane level. However, older cars may start to ping or knock even at the recommended octane levels because of deposits that accumulate in the engine. In this case, using higher octane fuel will also help.

JTso

iTrader: (2)

^^
If there are carbon deposits on top of the pistons, the compression ratio will increase as a result. Therefore, higher octane fuel would help to reduce the chance of knocking.

ChrismanTSX

The other thing to think about is that in a number of cases, the higher octane rating is achieved by adding ethanol. While this will be good for the engine and prevent knocking, your fuel mileage will suffer as a result...

Tsx6363

Me thinks this thread has been

rb1

"Top Tier" gasoline is basically a marketing thingy, it's not like the gas has some sort of independent certification that it's better.

That being said, members of the group claim to adhere to a published set of gasoline quality standards, but I don't know how it's policed.

dwest1023

First of all do not use any gas with ethonal. You get lower mileage. If a particular brand is using it, it will be posted on the pumps. That said I only use a brand with no ethonal and has techron in it. Currently in my area, the brands are BP, chevron, and Texaco. That is the ONLY brands that go in my cars.

thunder04

iTrader: (1)

As far as I can tell, all gas stations in my area put Ethanol in their gas, so I'm stuck there.

I don't pay too much attention to the brand of gasoline I put into my car but to the condition of the gas station itself. If the gas station looks crappy, I don't go there! If the gas station looks decently kept and their price is reasonable, it's good in my book. I've never noticed a performance difference between different gas station's premium gas.

I did fill up with regular once, just to see the difference. I noticed a little sluggishness when passing on the freeway, but not too much. The BIGGEST difference I noticed was when climbing hills. The engine seemed a little choppy & the RPM gauge would advance choppy when under load on an incline.

Premium all the way for me.

DVS-TSXER

You should use Shell 91 V-Power and mix it with Chevron 91 Techron so together you can have V-Tec gas yo

DNvCross

assuming one cannot get top-tier rated gasoline, what products would you recommend to use to clear out some of the deposits around the pistons?

also, it seems that everyone around my area also uses ethanol, so I'm stuck with it.

DuckDodgers

Ethanol is a fact of life and is expanding to everywhere...

I like either Techron (http://www.chevron.com/products/prod...ate_plus.shtml)

or Red Line SI-1 (http://www.redlineoil.com/products_f...bCategoryID=11)

Both will do the job, but you get more bang for the buck if you go with Red Line.

Vanilla_Gorilla

Its a California thing...its for emissions control during the summer months. They increase the amount of ethanol in the mixture to help reduce the amount of emission's for the increase in driving for the summer months. It is also why the gas prices go up in the summer, all of the refineries have to make the switch in order to make the gas with the added ethanol.

JTso

iTrader: (2)

^^
We do that here for the winter months.

aznboi2424

iTrader: (10)

i use premium if it says premium only. the brands i use are all top tier: chevron, shell, or 76. i prefer shell or chevron because their premium grades have cleaning agents. top tier is a stardard crerated by automakers such as BMW, mercedes and toyota. the other companies are tempting because the price is lower but i guess this would go back to the grade of gas: wouldnt you pay a little extra for a name brand?

DuckDodgers

Actually, it's a US thing...

The Energy Policy Act of 2005 mandates the use of 7.5 billion gallons of biofuel (of which ethanol is the most common), which is triple 2005 usage, in US gasoline stocks by 2012. Congress is on the pork barrel wagon, trying to increase this mandate...debate exists about if ethanol actual uses less or more than the energy in 1 gallon of gasoline to make 1 gallon of gasoline extender...plus we couldn't switch to pure ethanol as it would require more than the nations entire corn crop by a sizable percentage. The use of corn to make ethanol, while a boon to farmers and farm states, is driving up costs for related items like beef, milk (corn is used to make cattle feed), cereal, etc.

Ethanol was rolled out in place of MTBE nationwide and will now slowly creep into more and more markets until the Congressional mandate is met.

E85, or 85% ethanol is also being touted as a great advance, but cannot be used in the TSX. The issue with ethanol as a whole is moisture and corrosion. Ethanol must be trucked or transported by rail to distribution points as it absorbs moisture and thus cannot be sent through the US pipeline network. In vehicles, the fuel systems needs special hoses and stainless steel parts to use E85...and even then the starting qualities of E85 at and below -20f are terrible. In fact, in testing they could not get the vehicle using E85 to start after it got below about -20f unless they had a second system with pure gasoline to start the engine and warm it a bit.

With regard to energy content, and mileage, ethanol contains 34% less energy per unit volume than gasoline. This, with standard "up to 10% ethanol" gasoline blends the effect would be about a 3% reduction in mpg from straight gasoline or about 1-2% from reformulated gas. In the case of E85 the impact is much greater. The effective reduction in mpg depends upon the vehicle, but should run about 29% on average. This means that E85 should only be bought, when you have a flex fuel vehicle, if the price is 70-75% of than of a gallon of premium (premium because E85 is a high performance fuel and allows flex fuel vehicles to use high compression engines). Since that effectively means with premium at about a $3.00 average in the Texas, ethanol would only be a good deal at or below about $2.13 a gallon. Unfortunately, for those who like E85 or who believe ethanol is good, most stations selling E85 are keeping it somewhere around .10 to .20 cents less than regular (effectively a range of about $2.55-2.65) if not at the same price as regular.