Carmen

[irowiki]

David, I think it is directly related to how hard you stress a car out.

[ARCHINSTL]

Well, I will weigh in on the "Premium v. Regular War"...
I used premium in Goldie for the last 5 tanks, from August through March (OK,OK, so I don't drive that much...).
I noticed absolutely no difference between the two grades, whether in performance or mileage (or starting during the Winter).
I had expected at least SOME detectable difference, but was disappointed to notice absolutely none.
I don't imagine my Weber had any effect.

OT a tad, but I ran premium in several of my last Morris Minors back throughout the '60s-early '70s, which cured the notorious run-on symptomatic of the BMC "A" engines, gave a tad more power (I thought), and actually did yield a few more MPG.
While Goldie has never run-on or "pinked" using regular, I did expect some kind of measurable result (I've always kept a log of MPG on her).
Of course, the fuel blend back then was "real" gasoline and what is now available in the STL area is 10% ethanol.

I went to the premium when prices were lower than the prior regular last Summer and continued through Feb of this year. Premium is now 50¢ more than regular, so back to regular which is currently USD2.45 +/- locally.
Tom M.

[Petros]

If it makes no difference, than use the lower grade less costly fuel. That will happen with low compression engines usually. One way you can actually gain some from the higher octain is to advance your spark timing when you try the premium. the most efficient the engine will run is with the most spark advance you an get without ping. Premium fuel should allow more spark advance without ping, and that should improve fuel economy.

It may not make up for the higher cost, which means run it with the less spark advance and lower cost fuel.

[ARCHINSTL]

I did not change the advance, which was already at 10º BTDC.
Candidly, though - I'd forgotten about doing it...
Tom M.

[Mark]

*edit* just thought of another detail i want to point out. all my logged mileage in my current tercel has been over this winter, with temps between freezing and 15* C. i have found that ambient temps make a huge difference to fuel economy, as much as 15-20%, so i am confident that in the summer i would consistently get over 35 mpg, easily.

I have auto trans Tercels, but in the last year I've seen a huge difference between cold/warm weather and highway/city driving when it comes to MPGs. In my '81 sedan and '84 4WD wagon I get consistently about 31 mpg on the highway regardless of temperature. This winter (1-10 degrees celsius) with city driving (relatively short trips to work, maybe 8 kms/4 miles) I've been getting around 20 mpg in the sedan and 24 mpg in the wagon.
That's still better than the US EPA ratings of 22 in town and 24 on the highway for the wagon.
The sedan should be getting 26 in town and 29 on the highway.

[marlinh]

You guys don't get WINTER on the island, realistically speaking.

[Mark]

Sure we do. I notice that between Dec-Jan. there are less flowers and sometimes I have to wear a long-sleeve shirt just to feel comfortable outside. I remember once, maybe 3 years ago, the rain even froze as it fell. It wasn't clear ice like you would expect with frozen water. It seemed white and soft. This coated the ground in a layer maybe 1mm deep. I remember seeing the joggers in their shorts and t-shirts slipping on the sidewalks a bit until it melted about an hour later. We still talk about that year with wonder. It seemed so magical, like a Christmas movie.

[Carmen]

Lolol

[marlinh]

Oh, too funny! Do you even own a snow shovel?

[Carmen]

To update: Paint is on, trim gets done tomorrow. Looks damn fine! Got about 40 little dings and dents out of me body so all good in my hood.

The oem paint wasn't even close, it was this crazy bright orange.. In the end the gas door was pulled off to color match as best as possible, which was pretty damn good judging by the inside of the doors vs the fresh paint.

Really excited to get a buff and trim paint, be back on the road tomorrow!

[Carmen]

Also I see a slight timing advance in my future, after some comparison tests w/ several tanks of regular fuel to ascertain the difference between the two. Thanks for the tip Petros.

Cheers everyone, keep the discussion rolling!

[Mark]

Oh, too funny! Do you even own a snow shovel?

I was trying to think up a witty response, but gave up since I've honestly never seen a real snow shovel. Even in stores.
*Seriously Not Joking alert*: A couple of weeks ago I was driving past a hockey rink (yes, an indoor rink of course) and I saw the pile of snow melting in the parking lot from the Zambonis. I wanted to drive half-way up it and take a closely-cropped photo and post it here with some kind of caption like "winter is no match for the Tercel" or something like that. This would be in sympathy with most Canadians who have been suffering through blizzard after blizzard. Then I would post another photo more wide-angle showing that it was just a pile of ice rink snow and showing all the flowers in the background and the sweating people pickincking. I didn't do it because I thought it might be prickish.

[Mark]

To update: Paint is on, trim gets done tomorrow. Looks damn fine! Got about 40 little dings and dents out of me body so all good in my hood.

The oem paint wasn't even close, it was this crazy bright orange.. In the end the gas door was pulled off to color match as best as possible, which was pretty damn good judging by the inside of the doors vs the fresh paint.

Really excited to get a buff and trim paint, be back on the road tomorrow!

I was thinking of getting a can of oem-colour spray paint to use for touch-ups and I was wondering if it would actually match better than random gold-coloured spray paint I've been using. Now your post makes me think that it probably wouldn't be any better. I find that some paints are really close at certain angles, but they have a different reflectivity than the original paint and if you look at them at a different angle they look completely different.

[Mark]

Also I see a slight timing advance in my future, after some comparison tests w/ several tanks of regular fuel to ascertain the difference between the two. Thanks for the tip Petros.

Cheers everyone, keep the discussion rolling!

I set my advance to about 8-10 degrees and to be honest, I don't notice any difference in power or fuel economy. I assume the effect is so minor, I just can't notice it. Retarding the timing less than the factory 5 degrees is definitely noticeable with the loss of power.

[Carmen]

No, this paint was COMPLETELY off. Like think construction cone orange or something. There's zero way that it was the original color. Possible that the single stage version is different than multi or who knows what, I'm no Picasso nor do I paint cars.

The color whipped up is damnnn close