To those in the Atlanta area be fore warned about the BP station across from the Varsity.

I filled up two weeks ago on the way to middle Georgia and the Sunday event at Silver Dollar Raceway. On the way to the track my SES light came on which I reset at the track (didn't want to be annoyed) but it came back on just after I left on my way home.

After it occurred a few more times I hooked up my laptop to get the codes and it turned out to be misfires. I was a little worried that some of the work I had done might have gone awry and caused this but was sure that something else was causing it. So I re-filled the tank and added some Techron (wonderful stuff and the only additive to be used) and there has no been one single code set yet or any pending. This has beent he case for over a week. But what a coincidence…

In fact I pulled the plugs and they do look worse than than older plugs I had pulled from my '01 CL-S. There is much more charring and wear at the center electrode. One interesting aspect is that the plugs are different and not factory spec, but I'll ask that in another thread.

Now I wonder if this did affect performance. Had I had better fuel could the car have run better? It is a possibility which might be answered next week. But I’ll be at Atlanta Dragway a week from Friday which is about 500 – 600 feet higher in elevation than Silver Dollar Raceway.

 

funny you should say this cause my car runs like crap on Marathon gas. I was in the town where my girlfriend lives and theres a Marathon and a independent gas station (about 3-4 miles away) and trusty old Shell was 20-25 miles away. so we ran to Shell and filled up. I don't know what it is in Shell but i get the best mileage and seems like it runs great with Shell gas so that's all i put in it.

 

It is not always the brand but the seller. Some places will have the trucks put regular into premium, etc. But this is not prevelant in urban areas, mostly rural.

In this case I feel it is definitely the station. Since BP uses Amoco fuel and I love Amoco fuel and never have a problem with it there is something else going on.

This station just recently went under a major changes with what I assume would be new tanks. I wonder if ground water is seeping into these tanks?? We had just recently had quite a bit of rain and maybe some water could have gotten into the underground fuel tank and then later into my tank.

I'm tempted to have a fuel study done just for peace of mind...

 

Funny that you should mention that The weird thing is I am experiencing the same thing as you did with Shell gas, but the problem being that it pings (or tic's which i assume is pinging) like crazy, especially under light throttle. now I was getting about 320/340 miles per fill up on the Shell gas (14 gallons) but pings like there's no tomorrow.

Now I just went back to Mobil (the gas station!! ) and the pinging\ticking has completely disappeared, but the tradeoff being less fuel economy (apx 290/300 mile per fill up).

Now the choice, hmmmmm....better fuel economy, or a longer lasting engine??

 

interesting...

i've noticed i get the best gas mileage on shell, but haven't noticed any pinging. for some reason or another, i think my car runs the strongest on mobil.

i generally only put in shell or mobil.