COSTCO GAS SOURCE REVEALED

How much additives are actually added is the big question. Is it just enough to say that additives exist or is it actually enough to make a difference to your vehicle? I’ll stick to cheap gas and adding a bottle of injector cleaner a few times a year.

 

Not all Top Tier fuel is the same. Some have more additives than others.

I'm guessing Costco meets the minimum spec for Top Tier, but I don't know for sure.

Additives are important because they not only keep your fuel system clean but they also help reduce engine wear.

If you plan to keep your vehicle for many miles, a Top Tier gas that goes beyond minimum spec (Chevron, Shell, Mobil) is a good investment.

Costco is fine for most.

 

My lifetime of buying the cheapest gas around and keeping vehicles to high mileage without ever having an engine issue proves that theory wrong.

 

Science proves me right.

 

Yes, let's discount 97% of science and believe in anecdotes from forum members instead!

 

In my area, Costco is cheaper than any other gas station even the non top tier ones.
Lines can be insane at certain times of the day, so I usually go right at 6am when they open on my way to work and there's no one there (I do that with my daily driver).

Since the 4R is a weekend car I only fuel up once every month so I just put top tier gas from a station with no wait

 

In September 2023 everyone locally started reporting massive shortages in mileage per tank, like EVERYONE across the board. Anybody who was anybody and paid any sort of attention to their mileage per tank saw it, everyone was losing 30-50miles per tank all of a sudden including me in all my vehicles and it didnt really matter what gas station they were getting the fuel at. I bought an ethanol tester and went around to 15-20 local stations and bought $0.60 worth of gas at each of them to fill the tester twice and run the numbers and i logged them based on ethanol content to see if it was ethanol content causing the mileage decrease.
I do know from experience that ethanol blended fuels will get less miles per tank than 100% gasoline on older vehicles that were originally tuned for 100% gasoline. Anything built before 2008 was originally tuned on 100% gasoline and every time i have ever tested, they see about a 15% increase in fuel mileage on 100% gasoline if you give the ECU time to recalibrate its parameters. The reason is the AFR (air fuel ratio) the ECU is trying to see across the oxygen sensors. The ECU is programmed to shoot for xx.x AFR during its driving, the ECU is programmed to look at throttle input, RPM, load, and it calculates how much fuel is needed to run optimally during all these situations. This optimal efficiency is measured by the AFR across the oxygen sensors in the tailpipe. With the ethanol blended fuels, to achieve this "optimal" AFR the engine actually needs more volume of fuel, the injectors must stay open slightly longer to flow the additional fuel and this nets a loss of fuel mileage and less miles per tank. When you take that vehicle and switch it over to 100% gasoline and run it for 2-3 tanks you can see the ECU slowly return to its original programming and the 100% gasoline requiring less volume of fuel to achieve the "optimal" AFR results in less fuel burned, more miles per tank. Because of this, my initial thoughts were that everyone was seeing such a huge loss of miles per tank all of a sudden and i hypothesized it was an increased amount of ethanol added to the mix above the standard ethanol blend.

What i found out after checking all of these stations, knowing that all of these stations locally get refueled by the same tankers that deliver to all the other stations was not quite what i expected. I expected to see all of them have increased levels of ethanol content but the results are not exactly what i expected. The Murphy gas (Walmart/SAMS) and Loves (truck stops) both had 12-13% ethanol blend but pretty much everybody else had 8-12% which is what i have seen in the past testing with a standard plastic cup ethanol content reader. This made me wonder, if all the stations are getting gas at the same refinery/distributor station down on the harbor, why did everybody around town all start seeing a huge decrease in mileage at the same time but all of the Ethanol is the same as its always been? I didnt have a good answer, something happened for a few months there to the fuel mix and it was burning or evaporating faster than in the past. I did notice when i was collecting the samples, the color of the gasoline did change from one station to another. Some were lighter, some were darker. The 100% fuels were certainly darker than the ethanol blended. I spent over a half a day driving around getting less than a dollar worth of gas to check it out for ethanol content hoping i would find the smoking gun but i didnt find the info i was looking for. Something else got added into the tanks that made everyone lose a noticeable and measurable amount of mileage per tank. It lasted for a few months and slowly rolled out back to normal.

 

This..

gas has a standard that the manufacturers have to go by. It’s not uncommon that one manufacture pulls gas’s from another’s batch in the pipeline as they all use the same lines for the most part. Yes there are ways to separate a batch in the line but that is a long story on what and how it happens.


It comes down to 3 things on the retail side
1. what additives are mixed in while filling up the tanker trucks for delivery.
2. What standards the brand requires for the gas stations to maintain their tanks.
3. What is their guarantee that they are not going to cause any damage to your vehicle i.e. Exxon or Costco is going to pay up if they put bad gas in your car vs some no name one owner gas station that will go out of business when they damage multiple people’s car with a bad batch.

 

I only get my medical advice from whoever has the most shocked face, uses the most capital letters on social media and agrees with my existing biases.

Edit: There’s a joke about being able to beat whatever conclusion you want out of hard data, the minutiae behind the headline is key but I recognize it doesn’t necessarily make for attention-grabbing headlines.

 

Well, I hope these Shell and Exxon bunks use a good additive package. I go out of my way to only fill at either of the two.

 

Show us these engine failures due to a lack of gasoline additives.

 

Sounds like winter fuel blends. Do you live in a cold climate?

 

Depending the season....the refiners and marketing supply folks have to blend Butane in order to keep the RVP levels per the spec. I suspect this was the issue. How do I know? I used to make this stuff in my younger days (I was a refiner).

 

Show me where I said engines would fail.

 

Ethanol in my gasoline is why I hate environmentalists. What a waste of food, waste of our money, and it reduces gasoline shelf life from years to months.

 

Isn’t that what you were referring to when you wrote this?

“Additives are important because they not only keep your fuel system clean but they also help reduce engine wear.

If you plan to keep your vehicle for many miles, a Top Tier gas that goes beyond minimum spec (Chevron, Shell, Mobil) is a good investment.”

 

Weird way to spell corn lobby and politicians.

 

It wasn’t done by “environmentalists” even as it does have some emissions benefit, boosts octane and is less toxic than whatever alternative, whatever.

It’s a blend of factors including memories of the oil embargo, the Bush administration looking to reduce oil usage over time, but primarily to subsidize corn farmers some more.

 

I don't think it matters much where you get your gas just change your oil on time and run a bottle of seafoam through every time you change the oil.

 

Out here in California, in 1992 CARB initiated gasoline reformulation to comply with new state mandates on smog reduction. This is when I noticed a significant drop in miles/tank in my 3rd Gen, to the tune of over 5 MPG. This was not just the so called 'winter blend' (which btw also created another noticeable drop in fuel economy!) but known as "Oxygenated" blends which begin somewhere around 5 years later. Then, sometime in early 2000s MTBE was banned from use as an octane boost additive resulting in another decrease in fuel economy. So out here on the west coast our mileage gets hammered not just by the inclusion of ethanol but by the result of CARB mandates.

Sometime around a couple years ago when I was in Nevada I found a gas station that sold 100% gasoline and as a test in my 5th Gen I tanked up. Yup, instant gain of around 5 MPG after the ECM recalibrated.

 

I think it’s hysterical that arguments are breaking out over gas. I’ll pay the 5 cents more for shell or Exxon Chevron. I’m literally paying 1 dollar more per tank. I can’t disagree with @Turd Ferguson i had a Honda pilot that I traded in with 250k miles and never had a fuel issue running the cheapest gas. My 4Runner though is my baby. She gets Shell.

 

isn’t Costco top-tier certified?
if we’re worried about detergents or other additives, couldn’t you Add that before Fueling up?

 

Costco is Top Tier certified.

 

Ethanol is also added to gasoline at the bulk plant, not the refinery.

 

This is not how I remember it. It was pushed by environmentalists as a way to reduce emissions and oil consumption.

 

Where I travel getting 'top tier gas' isn't a problem. The tiny one owner gas stations that maybe would not carry 'top tier' gas are getting really thinned out, are like very few around, due to the cost of maintenance to said station. Lets say a BP sign exists at a small mom & pop gas station, when it's time to perform upgrades, water/tank checks, pump upgrades, electrical safety checks, painting by the gas pumps, it's very expensive, like to the tune of $80,000 a year, at least my friend who owned a BP branded station, shared with me.(saw the paperwork) How many NON 'top tier' owners are around to your estimation? I'm not saying they don't exist, but, look where your getting your gas from, use the brain, Top tier gas is in it's infancy, introduced like in the early 2000's, so what did we do before that? Granted, if you had a car years ago, when it got to 100,000 miles, you better be getting rid of it, now on the forum we have debates if a prospective buyer should be looking at a 4Runner with 175,000 miles.. just saying, have fun buying gas, I don't get to wrapped into it.

 

There are plenty of non top tier. Speedway, 7-11, pilot. Bucc ees. Wait I’m not going to shit talk Bucc ees. It’s heaven on earth. Pulled pork, banana pudding and a Dr Pepper. Wife gets the wrap. We open the 4R hatch lean in and chow

 

https://www.eesi.org/articles/view/summertime-when-the-livings-easy

Currently, about 95 percent of U.S. gasoline is sold as E10 (10 percent ethanol, 90 percent gasoline). Adding 10 percent ethanol to gasoline raises gasoline’s RVP rating by one psi, to approximately 10 psi, according to the National Renewable Energy Lab. Because of this phenomenon, the EPA granted E10 a one psi waiver (commonly referred to as the one pound waiver) in 1992. Currently, higher blends of ethanol, such as E15, do not have a waiver.
While neat ethanol actually has a very low RVP rating (2 psi), the chemical interaction between small volumes of ethanol and gasoline causes RVP to increase. As the volume of ethanol in the fuel is increased beyond 10 percent, this effect is erased, and the RVP of the gasoline begins to drop. At higher blends, such as E30, RVP is just below 9 psi. Because the RVP of gasoline drops as ethanol content increases, blends higher than E50 have a lower RVP than that of the base gasoline, and no RVP waiver is required.

E15 and the RVP Cap
E15 (15 percent ethanol and 85 percent gasoline) has been approved for use in Model year 2001 and newer vehicles by the EPA -- over 80 percent of the cars on the road today. Vehicle manufacturers have also certified the use of E15 in two-thirds of the U.S. market for model year 2015 vehicles. Increasing the standard gasoline blend from E10 to E15 would also reduce harmful volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions, displace cancer causing emissions, and reduce smog forming potential, as well as cutting greenhouse gases by 1.5 percent. E15 is also typically two to 10 cents cheaper per gallon than E10.
There is no technical reason for regulating E15 and E20 differently than E10, as their RVP ratings during summer months are similar.5 While E10 can be sold year round, E15 is not permissible for use as a summer blend as it does not currently have a one pound waiver from the EPA.





Retailers Seeking Regulatory Relief
According to numerous ethanol trade groups, gas station owners who would like to sell E15 are between a rock and a hard place. While they can freely sell E15 during the winter months, come summer, they must label the fuels as “FlexFuel Vehicle Only,” due to the one pound waiver applying only to blends up to E10. This requires sign change outs and other administrative changes and, therefore, is viewed as an impediment to selling E15 by many retailers.
Members of both the House (H.R. 1736) and the Senate (S. 1239) have offered legislation that would extend the one pound waiver to blends above E10. Doing so would allow the sale of E15 to 2001 and newer vehicles during the summer months. S. 1239 has 16 cosponsors, and H.R. 1736 currently has 46 co-sponsors. Until the one pound waiver is extended to blends above E10, retailers continue to face roadblocks when they decide to increase the fuel choices at their stations.


I too remember it as a way to cut emissions. As this article states, going up from e10 to e15 would reduce emissions by xx% and that was a big thing with the EPA.