Gas Preferences?

[T-Bagg]

What is everyones preference on gasoline as far as brand goes. What are your factors for choosing. Price? Cleaning agents? What octane grade is best for the '98 5.7 liters?

 

[General Stalin]

With prices the way they are, I put whatever is the cheapest in my tank. Brand has no play in it for me. As for octane, no one should be putting anything higher than 87 in their 350's unless their engine is modified and running high compression.

 

[Kontohoe]

I use either Mobil or Chevron because of their cleansing abilities and have always run 93 octane. I have 260,000 miles on my 1994 Chevy Tahoe, had over 205,000 miles on my 1998 Yukon (before getting t-boned) and now have 56,000 mikes on my "new" 1999 Tahoe. My mechanic told me to do this years ago and have been following his advice and I'm glad I did. No engine or catalytic converter problems ever! I credit the higher grade of gasoline on not having the probelms others have. It's either pay for it now or pay for it later IMO.

 

[General Stalin]

Using the higher octane gas is really just tricking yourself in to thinking you are doing your truck real good, unless you actually have an engine, or a modified engine, that puts out a high compression stroke.

High octane fuel literally serves no purpose but to allow you to run a higher compression engine. High octane fuel just has more additive "octane" chemicals that increase the amount of compression resistance the fuel has. The gasoline you put in your car has a certain amount of pressure it can withstand before is actually spontaneously ignites due to compression, this is called "preignition" and is no good when it happens inside your cylinder. Engines with high compression (I'm talking like 9.5:1 or more) cannot run 87 octane safely because the amount of pressure they produce in the stroke would cause it to preignite; this is where higher octane fuel comes in.

 

[T-Bagg]

So what companies carry the best cleaning agents and such. Or what additives do you guys put in your gas to keep the fuel system clean.

 

[Kontohoe]

T-Bagg, I run Gumout's REGANE total system fuel cleaner through all of my vehicles once or twice a year.

General Stalin, I have always considered the 5.7 liter MPI engine a "high performance" engine. It has a compression ratio of 9.1:1 Is there a big difference in compression ratio of 9.1:1 and 9.5:1?

 

[sasquatch094]

i heard BP gasoline carries water in it and i try to avoid that when possible. i can not tell you for a fact or not about this (just what i got on the news)... ive always heard not to run octane increaser in your gas eather. i dont know why but something to consider..... ive never used a cleaner like you were saying so i dont have anything to tell ya on that one..