"Dan_Musicant" wrote in message

I was chatting with my auto mechanic the other day and I asked him if he
thought all gas was pretty much the same these days - an idea I'd been
encountering. He didn't agree at all.


He said his truck was running sluggishly and he put in a tank of 76 high
octane and could hardly believe the difference it made. Suddenly the
truck ran smoothly. He said he has a lot of evidence that he and other
people are getting very significantly better mileage since switching to
76. I guess that's 76 Union, unless they've changed their name.

I asked him if he had any experience with their regular gas, and he
couldn't really say, it seemed.

Spend a day at the docks and the gas storage places. You'll see all sorts
of truck getting the same gas for different brand stations.

It may be possible that the truck responded to a different gas, but there
may be other reasons. Why was it sluggish? Is there some mechanical reason
that it was not running properly?
Unless something was different than normal (he may have changed computers
for all I know) there is no difference in 99% of the cars designed for 87
octane.

I drive about 30,000 miles a year, sometimes as much as 50,000. I've tried
different brands, different octanes, and if the car is running properly I've
not see any difference. This is in a half dozen cars I've driven over the
past 15 or 20 years.

I go for cheap and have no problems. My older car has 139,000 miles (the
plugs were changed at 75,000) and it starts, runs, and gets the same gas
mileage as the day it was new. My new car has 90,000 miles, original plugs,
same deal.

Try the 76 and report back. Chances are thee will be no difference except a
few $ out of your wallet.