Premium gas in Honda Civic? The myths? And my persona experience with my motorcycle?
I'm currently contemplating putting premium gas in my 2001 Honda Civic EX Coupe 5-spd MT. I've heard conflicting stories about Regular vs Premium gas. On one side, I've heard that all the octane does is prevent knocking or pinging, and putting premium gas in a car that doesn't need just wastes money, and could potentially be detrimental to the car's health. On the other side, I've heard a lot of benefits of premium gas: more power, better economy, and cleaner burns (prevents deposits and build up), the latter being particular important to me since my Civic currently has dirty injectors.
Now, I know octane is key for combustion, and I've seen and heard of many cars that switch between different grades of octane to achieve better power, but I've only really seen this in higher performing vehicles. But, then there's my personal experience with my 2014 Yamaha V Star 250 - I presume it left the lot filled with premium gas and that tank I got nearly 140 miles before having to switch to reserve (~1.6gal). I filled up with regular (twice) as per owner's manual instruction. I didn't even make it to 115 mi before having to switch to reserve. When I filled up with premium, I noticed immediately the exhaust was louder, I had more power, and my driving habit haven't changed much, so I can't find another way to account for the very noticeable discrepancy in fuel economy (74MPG vs 82MPG).
Should I put premium in my Civic? Neither vehicle states an upper octane limit. Premium is 91 here
Octane has a few uses. The first and primary use of octane in gasoline is to prevent engine knock. This is especially relevant in high performance vehicles operating at higher engine speeds where knock can cause some serious problems, and or cause a reduced engine life. However octane has other benefits. The higher the octane rating of a fuel, the slower it burns, meaning more energy is released over a longer period of time (per volume of fuel/air mixture). This increase in combustion performance means an increased fuel efficiency (depending how you drive) as you don't have to use as much fuel to accelerate from speed A to speed B. Higher octane fuels also burn more completely than lower octane, leaving less burn-off residue on direct injected vehicles, pistons, valves, and cylinders. Putting 91 Octane in a car rated for regular is fine, but anything over 91 can cause issues with fuel/air ratios which can lead to problems. Hope this helps.
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