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Mayuri Krab

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Mostly 95 on the SS, sometimes 98 and a few times on regular **** fuel when I’m out in rural WA and the only 98 pump was out of order.

One thing I was told is that 95 & 98 has lower maximum allowed sulphur vs 91 (max 50ppm vs max 150ppm) which was one of the main reasons that pretty much all (even non performance eco box) euro cars requires 95 at a minimal as their fancy engines can’t handle the extra sulphur levels (seeing how in their native country sulphur levels are in the 10ppm range from their basic 95 fuel).

Now the LS3 been old dinosaur tech without all the fine tolerance of the typical euro car probably don’t matter that much, but I always thought lower sulphur can’t be worser right?

As for E10, we don’t get that **** in WA lol
 

vr304

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We only get E10 at Gull and they are mainly in Auckland and a few other selected places in the North Island. E10 is no good for me with the blower.

E85 isn't really commercially available here at all, there are a couple of servo's that have it that are close to race tracks but it sells at a great premium and simply isn't worth the hassle.
They were selling e85 at a couple of selected gull sites like ours here in pukekohe but they have stopped now and replaced the E85 pumps with 95 octane (not sure if e10 or not) same as at Hampton downs
 

J_D 2.0

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One thing I was told is that 95 & 98 has lower maximum allowed sulphur vs 91 (max 50ppm vs max 150ppm) which was one of the main reasons that pretty much all (even non performance eco box) euro cars requires 95 at a minimal as their fancy engines can’t handle the extra sulphur levels (seeing how in their native country sulphur levels are in the 10ppm range from their basic 95 fuel).

Now the LS3 been old dinosaur tech without all the fine tolerance of the typical euro car probably don’t matter that much, but I always thought lower sulphur can’t be worser right?

Correct. We have the the sh!test fuel standards in the world. Even Mexico has a higher fuel standard than us! A bit shite that people have to run premium fuel just to get around the lax fuel quality standards.

The cynical me says that the reason the oil industry threatens to blow the joint up if the government makes a higher fuel standard is that then they couldn’t justify selling premium fuel for a 20 cpl extortion fee!

BP sell their premium fuel as a “dirt busting“ fuel. The only “dirt” going into your engine in the first place is the excess sulphur when you pick up the regular unleaded bowser at THEIR servos!
 

Immortality

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They were selling e85 at a couple of selected gull sites like ours here in pukekohe but they have stopped now and replaced the E85 pumps with 95 octane (not sure if e10 or not) same as at Hampton downs
Yes, I believe Hampton downs had one and possibly one close to Waikaraka park too. A mate put some in his tank once on his L67 and his AFRs went to ****. Quickly had to top up with 98 to dilute. It never took off here, shame really.
 

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This is all very interesting. Especially a V6 Ecotec getting any benefit from anything other than Lucifer's brew (91!). I'm not going to bother putting anything but 91 in mine because it's 20 years old, done 210,000km and I'm hardly getting it warm driving to and from work every day. No point.

However, we do have a 2015 X-Trail outside that has been subjected to a single tank of 91, and it didn't like it one bit. I run it on 95 now, but danged if it's entirely happy with the arrangement. It's only got 41,000km on it, 38,000 of them on a steady diet of Eneos hi octane with occasional interlopers whilst traveling.

(Sharp eyed viewers will note that Eneos isn't exactly common around these parts, and some also know that it's the connoisseurs choice...)

If you haven't worked it out (or don't want to, which is also fine) the family bus isn't from around these parts either, so has a 2.0 direct injection engine and pretty high compression ratio. It's at least 2 generations newer than the 2.5 they stick in the local models, and is supposed to tolerate 90 octane but it does not at all like it, making itself known by pinging pretty hard under moderate load and requiring significantly more throttle to accomplish modest motion. Direct injection is supposed to limit pinging, and it kind of does but there's no getting around low engine speed, heavy load and high cylinder pressure. There's only so much timing on the spark and fuel, and to make up for the shortfall you've got a add a lot more fuel.

In short, it burns about 6% more fuel on regular than it does on high octane, which was enough to just run it on high octane for the $$$ savings. Everything else (and not much, it's a family bus not a sports car) was a bonus.

If here was like where we got the red bus, and high octane was only 10c/l more, it'd be sucking down 98. The local cheap place, 95 is 13c more, 98 is 20c more, which all things considered is quite obscene. Heck, let's be honest the whole "owning, running and fueling a car" here is obnoxious enough, so don't let anyone tell you "owning, running and fueling a car in Japan" is terrifying, here is worse* (but not by much, let's not get carried away).

Stu.

*for example; The red bus we bought cost about the same here, $ for yen. There are features on our 5 year old that still aren't available on the newest model of it here for any money. And we had to wait 6 weeks for them to build it, to order. I wish I'd updated it before we bought it over, just to rub it in a little more. But we did have a second car there that cost us $2,500 to buy, was 9 years old at the time, cost $200 a year for full rego (Kei car!) and while it wasn't perfect, it was in very good shape for it's age. Flip to here, you can't find a car half as clean and sweet for double the money and age, and running it would automatically cost 4x the rego. Fuel would be slightly cheaper, but over the course of a year for a true 'second car', I know we were a lot better off over there. And because you could thrash the thing and still use FA fuel, it was awesome, so was cheaper to fuel as well.

My only regret was having to buy family cars while I was there, because family. Finally get the opportunity to buy what I want for me, and Covid screwed that up, backed me into a corner and I had to settle for something that cost me twice as much and has chewed up 2x the cost in parts the little car did. And I still didn't get what I wanted by a long way. :(

The way things have gone, I'll have to build what I want. The only question is how deep to go on build...
 

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I always use premium on long trips. Gives her a good drink and I find she responds better.

I used to do the same with the SV6. Used 91 for the regular drive to work and use 98 on long road trips to clean it out.
 

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a
 
Last edited:

vr304

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Went to go and look for prices for petrol 91 and I noticed the cheap servo that I usually use is 107.9 for e10 and 120 for 91.

Guess e10 is still on the menu boys :(

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I also noticed, Costco doesn't have 91 and that premium is only 117 there.

For 10 cents more, 98 seems competitive here.
I’d be using 98 full time at that price mate, we can only dream of paying that for 98 octane here in NZ!
 

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PULP98 has mysteriously come down again here in the deep south of Victoria after a high of $1.80/L last week. It's now $1.28/L. Here' the math: Lockdown finished —> More cars on the road = ideal time to fleece the the travelling public as they relish their newly-granted freedoms of moving about. Just watch what happens when we get close to Christmas...
 
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