"Webre, Steven P." wrote:

Hans,

Actually Steve, many modern cars will have more power with premium fuel,

latest autoweek quoted a Honda engineer as saying that the new accord V6,
while not requiring premium fuel would gain 10HP using it.

Totally agree and I'd think all new cars have this in their system.   Real
time engine "tuning" has been the holy grail of automotive engineers for
decades.

However, I was referring to our "average" US car.  My '97 GMC will advance
the timing slightly under certain conditions until it senses knock.  Lower
octane fuels will make the computer back off the timing earlier but it's not
something you or I can "feel" during normal driving.  MPG will be affected
more than acceleration performance and even then, the gain is minimal on the
average size car/truck.

Please keep in mind that 10 hp increase at WOT for an Accord is not
something I think you're gonna feel.  The stopwatch will see it, but most of
our butts won't.

I'd speculate that for most folks, checking their tire pressures more often
could improve their cars performance (acceleration and MPG) more than
spending $$ for higher octane fuel....

Steve Webre
Broussard, LA

 
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