Survey on gas octane

I would be interested in hearing from a bunch of folks about the octane they use on a regular basis, and if there are any specific reasons/conditions that drive that selection. I will appreciate it.

 

85 octane (around 6000’ above sea level), its the high elevation equivalent of 87 octane.

 

I hit either 88 Octane E15 or 89 mid grade E10. I have to do quick math when I am at the pump to make sure the savings (cost per MPG) is in E15's favor. Sometimes it is. Sometimes it isn't. Both run about the same, but I get about 1.5 MPG better with E10.

 

Regular because its what my manual calls for.

 

We use 87 everytime.

 

87 works just fine for my pro

 

87 because it’s the cheapest and I believe what Toyota recommends. Seems to work fine so I haven’t considered messing with it.

 

Just "regular" here also (85 or 87?? not sure.) Vehicle seems to run fine no knocking or anything.

 

Hopefully 87. 85 is definitely too low.

 

Hmmm I don't know I'll have to look next time I just select the "regular" when I go. Maybe it's not 85 I'm guessing.

 

I doubt it is 85. I don't know if that is even available.. LOL

 

I am hearing a pretty loud response that regular 87 is used. I am fine with them, but now probably the most important question is which brand? I use mapco, because of the discount card policy, but am thinking that top brand grade is better. to me there are three distinctive brand categories: top, like Exxon, shell. mid: like mapco. and no brand names that all all over the place. I have had folks tell me that all gasoline comes out of the same pot and that it is a suckers game. I have to think there are additives for the top brand. agree disagree?? what does your experience say??

 

I buy whatever and don't notice a difference. Suppose it's like motor oil people have their favorites case closed. Personally I think your over thinking it but again just my .02
I also have a card that saves me 10 cents a gallon here in Mass but notice other stations a penny or two within that price anyway. Honestly I don't much think about it.

 

When I first got my 4Runner I tried 91 for about 2 months. In theory it increases hp and torque a little (270/278 vs 285/289) I then switched to 87 to compare and I couldn't tell any difference in acceleration, power, etc. As far as brand I try to use one of the top tier brands. In my are that would be Quick Trip, Costco, and Valero. It costs the same or less than other brands so even if it is a gimmick (i don't have proof one way or another) there really isn't a down side to it compared to the other brands.

 

While it might all come from the same "well", the top tier brands add detergents to their gasoline that help keep things like fuel injectors cleaner. Buying top tier gas is just investing in the long term use of the components of your entire fuel system. I buy 87 from places like Chevron, Shell, ect....

 

I am hearing a consensus that 87 is the go to as recommended by T, and a split as to top tier v. non-top tier brands. I tend to agree on top tier- spending $35+ for something that will be no downside and probably better for your "investment" for a nominal savings. I see lots of folks adding expensive mods as to tires and other amenities without a second thought as to price, so why not the energy used to make those operate at top potential. Just my observation 2cents. this forum is great and lots of perspectives and ideas.

 

I use regular gas, 87 octane. It costs $0.20 less per gallon than premium gas. Why pay more? It's one of the reasons I bought the 4Runner over the Lexus GX460 or the Jeep GC V8. To save on the cost of operating the vehicle.

 

The 4R's made to run on 87 and seems to do so just fine whether higher octane does anything worth worrying about can be debated till the fat lady sings. Who knows maybe it'll make a difference somehow 250,000 or 300,000 miles from now but I'm not that concerned about 15 years down the road.

 

I am a Fool. I am the guy that everyone likes to make fun of because I will spend the extra for any Octane over 90. Since the 80s now when I owned a 68' Camaro w a 327 Vette engine. No excuses except personal preference.
Most vehicles it doesn't make a noticeable difference in mileage or performance, not now, not ever. Years ago I had a 1990 Sentra that I ran 93 in the whole time I owned it.
At one point my Father who is quite frugal and knowledgeable in the stock market as well our nations fuel and how it's being traded, had read up on the subject and asked me the same thing as many on the forum...."Why are you wasting your MONEY!!?".
So I put a tank of 87 in the Sentra. Within 30 miles this little car was running ok with the only difference being when going through the gears on the 4 speed manual, my usual shift points were detonating. Not a little, a lot. Now did I need to rev the little 4 cyl over 3k rpms? No, but that is where I had been shifting for years, and the Nissan didn't like it. Adjusting for it I avoided the detonation for the rest of the tankful and went back to 93 the next tank.
Sorry but I like a car that will RUN when I punch it. Now maybe I got a cruddy tankful of 87, or maybe if I had let the ECU adjust the timing over several tanks it wouldn't have been so bad after time. This was the late 90s and I have never purchased 87 for a personal vehicle ever again. The 1GR-FE Dual vvti is a 10.4 to 1 compression engine. Yes the vvti can adjust all of the jetting and timing in a millisecond to compensate for lower octane. But when I had old V8s back in the day, we advanced the timing as much as we could to improve performance, and I would like to give my ECU the opportunity to do just that. Advance the timing as much as the octane level will allow it to. If you run exclusively high octane, the ECU will adjust to a higher advance threshold because the higher octane allows it too.
Does this make a noticeable difference in performance? No, only in my easily fooled mind. It's not a race car and I'm not testing for the EPA so why do I spend all this money? Because to me it feels like it runs better and my spark plugs always come out nice and charcoal colored with just a hint of amber.
jmho and yes I am a Fool, let the flaming begin lol. Thank you and have a great day!

 

I did a test on the different fuel grades years ago on my Tacoma and found the higher octane gas does provide a consistently very very “slight” increase in mpg’s. However the cost difference makes using anything over 87 octane a waste of money. Now IMHO using ethanol free gas is worth every penny. I found the throttle response and mpgs increased so I generally try to use it when I am towing. When I had my Tacoma I was using the Fuelly app and I got my best every mpg ever 21.5 (after 5 years of calculating...) while towing 1.5k and using Ethanol free gas. The crappy part is I have to travel hours north of me to get it but when I have the opportunity to run it I alway do.

 

My spark plugs look pretty, I use 87 octane.

 

so what is the consensus on using ethanol free? does our manual say anything about it?

 

Ethanol free gas is fine to run. I think the manual suggests to use a blend of 10% ethanol or less, so obviously Ethanol-free gas fits into that category. People have run up to E85 before, but you will most likely have some sensors go off. E85 will not blow up your engine or anything like that, but your ECU will detect the problem and throw a check engine light most likely.

Your best bet is to do what the manual says and run 87 octane with 10% ethanol or less.

 

I have heard that the EPA testing that Toyota did on the 4Runner to obtain the MPG results were done using 93 E0 gas. Can anybody confirm that?

OK -- I did run 93 octane in my truck and it seems to idle smoother and have a little more pep but I could not see any increase in gas mileage to justify the additional cost of 93 octane fuel.

I do try and run E0 -- pure gas -- whenever I can and if it makes sense. On a trip thru Oklahoma we stopped at Quik Trip in Muskogee and they had E0 selling for only 25 cents more per gallon than the E10. OK, so I used the E0.

The only real results I have was we came back on a trip from Minnesota to southern Iowa and taking the scenic route through Missouri to Oklahoma and I was able to gas up at every station on the trip with 91 to 93 Octane fuel that was pure gas - E0. The speed limit for nearly all of the route was 65mph and since we were not in a hurry we stuck to that using the cruise control. That portion of the trip we were getting around 25 mpg.

Right now in winter in Texas using 87 octane E10 I am getting around 16.5 to 17.0 around town and about 20.0 to 22.0 on the highway at 70 to 75mph.

I have noticed in the one trip that the truck would get closer to 22.0 on the highway at 70mph than trying to push 75mph.

I also noticed that after the first oil change at 10,000 miles my mpg went up by 1.

The only other item I have done was at about 10,000 miles I removed the limited's 20" wheels and put on 17" wheels with Michelin Defender P265/70 R 17 tires.

I have read somewhere on here that you would get better fuel mileage with 17" tires than the 20", but not sure if that is the case.

I also understand that if you are towing with a 4Runner or running it fully loaded down, you should use 91 or 93 octane as the engine will perform better with that.

Todd

 

i have been running 87 and sometimes 89 on my t4r and only getting 15.5 - all town driving, mileage at 1,000. thinking i should be getting better. I don't dog it but do have to press it at times to get out of the way of coeds driving their daddy's beemers and mercedes plus guys driving their big 4x4 like hell.

 

I’ve always put the highest octane in my truck since I’ve owned it. It runs like brand new. Prob better than new. 300,000 miles and just getting broken in?

 

87 and anything else is a waste of money imo

 

i did try different fuel octanes .. 93 gave it more power. no MPG changes. so stay with 87 ..

 

If your truck only has 1,000 miles on it, then it's possible your mileage will get better as you get up to 5,000 or 10,000 miles. The biggest difference you can make in mileage is driving habits. You would also get better mileage on a fuel without ethanol; however, an ethanol blended gasoline (E10 for our vehicles) does help in reducing carbon build-up and is most likely better for your motor long-term.

 

Just my .02..it does vary a lot on vehicle and engine. My wife's Forester is rough and loud on 87, but purrs on 93. My 300 that I traded in on the T4R got nearly 4 mpg's better using 93 E0 than 87 E10, it did about 2.5mpg better using 93 E10. I did the same testing when I first got the 4runner. First tank was 87 E10 and avg was 18.1. Second tank was 93 E10 and avg was 18.9, then tried 93 E0 and only got to 19.2. So it didn't make much of a difference between them. I still, out of habit with other vehicles, run 93 E10 but only from top tier stations.