Rodrigo

So I'm on the way home from work yesterday around 4:00 pm.

I pass gas station #1, where the price had shot up during the day to $3.79 per gallon.

Two blocks down the road, I pass gas station #2, where the price hadn't increased yet and was still $3.43. I was stopped at the light there, and took a moment to study the lot. There were cars at every pump, with at least 6 cars lined up in each of 8 lanes awaiting their turn. Plus people ahead of me were signaling madly their intent to turn in.

To buy gas at that point would easily have been a twenty minute proposition; a half hour was more likely.

A little math: a price difference of $0.36 per gallon times 10 gallons for a typical sedan fill-up equals a $3.60 savings. So people are willing to give up a half hour of their time (on the way home from work, no less) to save $3 - $4 on a tank of gas.

Does anyone else think this is stupid?

Hell, even a fill up of my F-150 (20 gallons) yields a cost difference of six or eight bucks. Man... my time is worth WAY more than that to me.

/rant

HateOnEveryone

6$ a week x 4 weeks is 24$ a month which is roughly a tank of gas every month and a half. 24 x 12= 288$ a year which adds up.. How ever personally i wouldnt waste my time id pay the xtra money.. Same goes for the fact i put silver in my car insted of save 15cents a gallon on regular

tipnitty

Cool story........bro.

ezone

Next step: pump in the cheapest thing you can find.

E-85 is the cheapest.

Until your check engine light comes on. Honda doesn't have any flex-fuel cars.

Guess how much that tank of cheap gas costs now.

Yeah, I just got done doing another one. I fully expect this to continue as long as fuel prices climb.

iSharix

I see nothing wrong with it. Everyone has different financial situations. Who are you to call them out for being stupid for "wasting their time"?

:S

Balzdpr

MindBomber

Gas prices expected to hit $7 a gallon this summer.

lowlife9

they probably didn't change the signs yet so they probably ended up paying just as much plus whatever fuel they wasted idling.and 7 dollars a gallon god dam i hope not thats just crazy. i also heard that tesla motors is going down the tubes regarding there cars becoming bricked if the batteries get completely drained the car is completely bricked the batteries have to be replaced with a price tag of 40,000 dollars.

MindBomber

To be fair, $7 a gallon would be Canadian Prices, you guys will probably only hit $6. At the moment I'm $6.24 a gallon.

The bricked Teslas are a big deal and clearly a major design flaw, but Fisker seems to be taking off.

HateOnEveryone

Mingggg glad i.got a d17a1

n8marsh

what's involved with fixing that foolishness? Lines, pump, injector seals?

fyi kerosene is also pretty terrible for a Honda haha

ezone

E-85, I think it really could have been left alone and run until the tank was empty, then fill with regular gas, and clear the code once regular gas is in it. I don't really think a single tankfull will hurt anything. This is only my opinion, not a statement of the manufacturer.


Multiple tankfulls probably will hurt it, the fuel system isn't designed for the high alcohol content.

Customer opted to fix it:
Pump the tank empty.
I found a flex-fuel vehicle to pump it into.
Refill with gasoline.
Clear codes, test drive, check fuel trims.

With Alcohol (ethanol), all I really have to do is get it diluted to somewhere around 10-15% and it will be ok. All our fuel has up to 10% ethanol to start with, so 15% total content is ok by me.

Yeah, diesel ruined a year old Odyssey van engine for a customer of ours here. Collapsed the pistons.
With diesel in the tank, getting the tank completely empty is far more critical due to the astronomical amount of damage that can result. This trashed the engine, and multiple cats. The second round of damage was really the fault of the first shop for not doing a thorough job getting the diesel out, and the owner drove it 4 or 5 hours on the highway to get home. The first shop only used the fuel pump to drain the tank, and that left too much in the tank. They should have opened up the tank to drain it completely.

lowlife9

at the moment the cheapest gas in my town is $3.80 thats with the 40 cents a gallon tax my state tacks on. its IRVING gas which is a canadian gas company.

Stock 99

You're at $1.56/litre right now? It's $1.22/litre here for 87 octane these days and it's been steadily coming down from the $1.30's since Christmas.

Top Gear UK just reviewed the Fisker in their last episode. I feel pretty 'meh' about it. Nice looking car though. All these electric and hybrid cars are going to completely disappear once the hydrogen fuel cell reaches the mainstream market. I'm kind of doubting I'll ever own an electric/hybrid and that's just fine by me.

MindBomber

Yup.

Regular is $1.43 liter, but I've been driving a different car the last couple days and have been filling up with 91.

Regarding electric and hybrids over hydrogen, I see the majority of new cars being one of the two within the decade and all cars being full electric within our lifetime. Hydrogen fuel cells are on the out IMO.

VTEC-4.0

It's not stupid,that couple bucks you save may not seem a lot to you,but to others it is.Do the math,you'll save a few hundred each year.I have to fill up with 91 which is already above $4.50 in So Cal and I fill up after a week or a week in a half.I'm paying 75 bucks for a full tank so yeah it'd be nice to save some cash.There's always a long line at the Costco near my house for gas,but I'll wait.

04 Honda Civic

iTrader: (2)

Hey times are tough, people are willing to do whatever they can to save money. What does not seem good for you may seem amazing for the next person.

Maybe that guy waiting 30 mins to save a few bucks makes minimum wage and has a kid. You never know peoples situation.

If I was a doctor/lawyer making 100k a year I would say it would be silly to sit there and wait for a few bucks. Its all about trade offs, isnt that what all of life is about anyway? Reminds me of economics class..lol

Personally I wouldnt wait there unless I needed the gas badly enough. I also perfer bp, mobil gas over the "no name" brands. Some people say its all the same, but I have personal experiences that say other wise.

DarkSouljur

Remember you actually wouldn't save that much a year because it isn't something that happens all the time. Let's say it happened 20 /52 weeks in a year (which to me still seems high) and u save an average of 4$ eachtime. That's 80 bucks for a whole year, that's not much saving for the 10 hours of waiting through the year haha

Get what I'm saying?

No way in hell would I wait 10 hours to save $80 :P

POQbum

lol..
yea I use to drive 15 minutes out of my way to buy gas that was ~10 cents cheaper.

Then I did a little math.. and found out I only saved about a dollar every time.

Then I realized I was an idiot and just started using the one right next to my house on my way to work

ezone

Nobody is loyal to their local gas station.
Everyone is a ***** for one cent per.
And will drive all over town to find that.
Amazing.
Math, there is none.


OTOH, when there is a huge price difference...... like the 50 cents per gallon jump the other day..

Rodrigo

Ok... if anyone was offended by this thread because they're really in a dire economic situation, and the three dollar savings is truly significant to them, then I sincerely apologize. It was harsh of me to label the behavior of others as 'stupid'. Trust me, if I think you're stupid I won't tell you.

I didn't notice any cars that would fit the profile of such an economically stressed owner however. Typical for that part of town at that time of day, lots of nice, late model cars.

I'm very fortunate. When I concluded over the winter that gas prices were going to go crazy for the next couple years, I had the means to go out and get an additional car that would be vastly more efficient than my DD full-size pickup.

I was simply sharing my observations on how emotional people get over gas prices. I think that's the American Dream, man... to sell a product that people are willing to pay virutally any price for.

Like many guys, I enjoy movie quotes. Reading through a couple of responses, I was reminded of one from an old Clint Eastwood WWII movie, Kelly's Heroes: "Up yours, Baby."

Peace to all.

Balzdpr

Thats not true man. I use the Exxon near my house all the time. In fact more often than any other gas station in town or else where. I use it regardless of a **** bitch Walmart gas station which just crowded her *** in next door at as much as 6 cents a gallon less. I buy the best gas I can afford for my car because I believe that there is still some quality out there. I love my car, and everything about it except the lame *** performance.

DarkSouljur

Me and my cousin shift-E are the same, we normally try to only fill at shell gas stations no matter the price, their nitrogen enriched gas is probably better than most other gas stations around. I don't always go for the highest octane but I do occasionally. Maybe it's in my head but I think my car runs much better after I've filled with shell a couple times versus say Esso. Price is usually the same, but even if I do have to spend the extra buck or two I really don't mind... That's just one less McDonalds double cheeseburger that I probably shouldn't eat anyways

Balzdpr

Cool. I like to use the nitro(gen(e) enriched stuff too. But theere is some distance to travel from my neihborhood to get it and Exxon is just as good for me. I dont believe in higher octain gas as the manual suggest the lower and I try to stick to that. Ive heard in here that it is best if you do. I dont have anything special installed or any particular upgrades which warrent any higher octain. When I do thou I will for sure feed this bitch a nice fat diet of pure POWEERRRR.

iSharix

+1 on Shell gas... the car definitely runs better compared to Esso gas

Rodrigo

How does "nitrogen enrichment" change the nature of the gasoline? It's mostly inert, and difficult to get to react with anything. It mostly just takes up space in the earth's atmosphere (something like 80%).

Not trying to start anything... just wondering what it's supposed to do at a chemical level.

I just buy gas at the place that's on the way to wherever I'm going.

lowlife9

it suppose to clean the carbon deposits on the valves but you can just use an off the shelf gas cleaner to accomplish the same thing.its just a detergent but all gasoline in the us has to have detergents in them required by the EPA.

DarkSouljur

I actually read that on how stuff works earlier today

"Shell's engine-cleaning gas isn't technically anything new, either, since all gasoline products have been required by the EPA to include a minimum amount of additives and detergents [source: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency]. However, Shell's gasoline does meet and exceed TOP TIER Gasoline Detergent standards, which is a voluntary standard that several major automakers including Audi, BMW, General Motors, Honda, Toyota and Volkswagen created in order to improve the quality of gasoline."

I dont know if there are shells in america or if canada has the same gasoline detergent laws.

Also i know i could get shelf gas cleaner but this way my engine is always feelin smooth rather than letting gunk build up and gettin rid of it later

Stock 99

I did some reading about Canadian gasoline standards awhile back and basically all top tier gasoline's are the same. If you like Shell then more power to you. All the top tier companies have their little 'extra' to build alliance to their brand. What you have to watch out for that is specific to Canada is non top tier brands use a additive called MMT (or MTT, I can't remember) and it is used to help boost the octane. It also will lead to the demise of your catalytic convertor.

BTW - I always use the same gas station regardless of the price. I went from driving a truck to driving a Civic in the last year. The price of gas doesn't really concern me anymore.

gearbox

iTrader: (95)

the people that do this usually have no idea that they could be saving hundreds by doing a few simple and free/cheap mods to their car and changing their driving style. that would be more cost effective than saving a few bucks at the pump, provided you dont burn it away idling your car for 30 mins. but thats not how most people think. they only worry about cost when they need to fill up the tank, not while driving. good luck to them, its really not my problem. meanwhile i will keep getting +5mpg above the old epa sticker numbers and patiently wait til i can afford an electric car with solar charging station. paying for fuel to drive will be outdated soon enough. and in 10 yrs, most electrics will cost around $20k or less with the tax breaks. heck today you could pick up a nissan leaf in cali for around $22k after rebates. batteries are simple things and the cost will come down. most older nimh hybrid batteries can be rebuilt better than new for around $1.2k, nowhere near the $5k hybrid haters will have you believe. lithium is still expensive, but so was nimh 8 yrs ago.

oh btw, citgo/philips66 is the best gas, followed by chevron/mobil, and shell is a distant third.