Chevron, Shell, 76, or Costco

Any of the top tier stations will be good-

Top Tier Gasoline

I haven't noticed a difference between them myself so I go to whichever of the top tier stations in my area is cheapest.

 

I usually use Costco gas and sometimes get Shell or BP. I don't see a big difference among them in mpg.

 

You want gas from a busy station, gas that just sits there, absorbs water from the underground tank.

 

I use Costco as it is cheaper than almost all stations, has large turn over and have never had any problems. Costco has a guarantee on their gas, if you don't like it they will refund your purchase price. I can't stand buying Chevron for ~15-20 cents more pure gallon just for the name. Never has seen any data to suggest that it is worth the extra $.

 

Guarantee or refund for gas? Hell I'm buying gas from Costco. Complain once every 4 fill ups and it's 25% off. Driving my Sienna will feel like a Prius afterall.

 

I go to the station with the cheapest fuel (within a certain radius). Lately that's been Marathon and Sunoco. I use the standard 87 octane fuel.

For 7 years I've filled my previous car with 93 octane fuel from Shell, Chevron, or Mobile. At $70 per fill up (compared to $21 for my Prius), I'm over paying top dollar for fuel. As long as the station has a high turnover, you should be fine as the fuel doesn't sit and build up moisture.

SPH-L710 ?

 

Correct.

Not really.
There's an alleged slight benefit in what they refer to as "Top Tier" gas.
You're a a young person, driving a 2013 car. That means that somebody else will almost certainly be driving it in 2017.
Even if there was a significant difference?
You're not going to see it unless you keep the car for well over 100,000 miles.

I'd be much more concerned about getting gas in a clean facility with working restrooms and decent coffee....but that's me.

Repeat after me:
Your dad is ONE HUNDRED PERCENT RIGHT.
Now...when you get to be thirty...or forty you'll still be saying that only for slightly different reasons.
Of course....since you're dad is probably not a chemist or a petroleum engineer???
He might not actually really be "right."

Just agree with him or it will devolve into a looooooooooooooooooooooooong argument that nobody can really win.

If you check forums for any car, truck, motorcycle, jet-ski, aircraft, snowblower, or Buck Rogers Jet pack?
You're going to read pages, and pages, and pages of goofy arguments about which gas is better or "best."

You wanna know why?
That's because nobody really knows, which is the same thing as no gas is "Really" better.


Good Luck!

 

"I’d like to return this gas, I didn’t use it and it’s like new."





I don't like Chevron because I think they are getting too big. They also own 76 now too.

I try to go to Shell but in reality, I basically hate them all which is part of the reason I got a Prius. If I had a place to plugin where I live, I'd have a Nissan Leaf or Tesla.

 

I'll go with your Dad, Chevron is one of the best. Regular gasoline is all you need. If you are driving in the mountains you should use mid grade, the reason being that you don't know how much wear is being done to the anti-knocking device in your car if you use regular. Add a can of Chevron Techron to your gasoline tank about every 6 months. It will make your car run better, therefore, you may see a little increase in your gasoline mileage.

 

No, no and he has no way to KNOW that......unless he works in the petroleum industry.

If you live close to a refinery, east west or south coast in the US, then there might be some slight difference in the brands. Most of the country, however, that gets it's gas out of a pipeline gets "commodity gas" with slightly different additive packages.......if the truck driver remembers.

I think that attention to tank maintenance might be more important than brand but it's hard to tell which stations change their filters regularly and attend to tank samples like they should.

I opt for large chain stations with lots of volume; Speedway, Pilot, Kangaroo, etc.

 

I agree. Other than additives, the fuel essentially comes from the same source. Beyond that, the store maintenance would matter and the volume at the store helps to get fresh fuel and less chance for water.

 

yes

 

FWIW I use the cheapest gas around that has high turnover, which tends to be Arco/BP out here. I buy from large stations that have very high throughput due to consistently low prices. Every once and a while I have to fill up at a Shell or Chevron due to poor planning, and I've never seen it make any difference in mileage or performance.

 

Check out this article :

All Fuels Are Not Created Equal - Technologue


All Fuels Are Not Created Equal - Technologue - Motor Trend


Nexus 7 ?

 

I'm partial to Chevron, for a variety of fairly trivial reasons:

1. They're the one hold out in our area still offering free air.
2. They're nearby.
3. I trust the name.
4. I like the colors/logo. (I did say trivial, lol.)

Back a decade I was a Shell fan, for similar reasons as above. I can't recall exactly why I switched. Possibly location. Also, I don't believe they offer free air anymore. <Any gas companies listening in...?

Regarding octane, the lowest (87?) is fine. That's explained in the Owners Manual, albeit confusingly, since different countries have different ways of stating octane. In Canada the numbers are some sort of average, that never corresponds to what's in the Manual, but anyway: the lowest octane is fine.

Higher octane is only needed by higher compression engines, the gas is HARDER to ignite, a requirement to avoid pre-ignition/backfire. Higher compression engines tend to run hotter, have more possibility of glowing deposits in the combustion chamber, that can ignite the air-fuel mixture before the spark plug sparks.

The above's not readily apparent looking at the way stations are setup, the variety of pumps at higher octanes. There's a recent CBC MarketPlace show on the subject:

Premium gas in regular-fuel cars not cleaner, expert says - Canada - CBC News

 

Very interesting.

 

OK alls the article is really saying is TopTier.com is certified to be acceptable, which we knew but skeptics among us wonder how important that is. I try to stick with TopTier. Costco, even though not TopTier, my perception is they probably add enough detergent to be good quality. I don't go to Costco but they just built their first station here...low cost leader, ironically I think maybe that bumped everyone else up in cost. I was surprised to see BP on the the TopTier list, I wonder if that is a new addition.

The article did not say what I am trying to say, all gaso may not be equal becuase they have different energy content, which you can't really control becuase it varies depending on season, region, EPA requirements, but may also related to local factors. As far as quality of say Chevron vs. others, my thought would be if you are using EPA reformulated gasiline like we are here, then the EPA requirements tend to eliminate some of the variation we might have seen in the past (ie more equal).

In general I think CR misleads by saying all gasoline is the same. Actually it is all way differerent, but performs the same due to octane rating as the common denominator. But unless you do chemical analsis each fill-up you cannot really know the differences. If Toyota or someone could give us weight of gasoline in the tank upon fillup, then we would start to have some data on energy content we got.

 

Here is a response from Costco about Top Tier gas.

Costco Response to Top Tier Gasoline Inquiry - AudiWorld Forums

 

Stated like that, CR is wrong and so are you.

Not sure I understand what you are actually trying to say though.

The reason CR said what they did is: In most parts of the country, there are bulk terminals which are connected to a pipe line. The other end of that pipe line is at a single refinery. In the area around the bulk storage terminal EVERY station gets their gas from the same tanks and same pipeline......so the basic gas IS all the same.

There are a few exceptions as some brands will truck their gas farther than others but none of them always gets all their gas from their own refineries.