[alfa] Re: Quality of gas -- anybody use lower octane?

[Alcon98340@xxxxxxx]

Clay,
Someone most likely has answered this, but yes, we max out at 91 octane  fuel 
here in sunny (usually) California. Does anyone know why this is? I would  
suspect this may have something to do with CARB (California Air Resources  
Board), but no factual data on which to base that. A comment about higher  
compression and lower octane gas. Usually if the compression is raised, one will  want 
to increase the octane of gasoline used in the vehicle. The reason for this  
is that the higher the octane rating, the slower it is to ignite (cooler  burn 
as well?), which means it requires more heat to create  
preignition/detonation. That being said, I have heard of some cars that actually  do lose power 
running higher octane gas. One of the car magazines did a test of  cars using 
different octane fuels, and the Honda Accord V-6 actually produced  better power 
with 87 octane vs. 91. Perhaps someone who is better informed  technically 
about gasoline's properties can verify/correct my statements  regarding higher 
octane fuel.
-Josh
'71 1750 Berlina
'72 2000 Berlina
'84 GTV6
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