Shell is used in the LeMans Series Endurance races. Can't be that bad, right?

 

A friend of mine and former co-worker who moon lighted as a Fuel Delivery driver drives a Semi on his off hours delivering gasoline to Citgo gas stations. He told me that the only company out here in the North East whom has their own tanks is MOBIL because of the additives.

He said tankers from all the other major companies pumped from the same storage tank. So basically several brand name tanker trucks were all pulling up to the same strorage tank......

Can't speak for other regions though.

 

Today I tried Mobil.
The Clubman is running
beautifully. Anyone else
tried Mobil, or have any
inside knowledge about it?

 

I believe the Mobil recently (a few months ago) stopped (or will soon stop) providing gasoline to it's stations. The stations are allowed to keep the Mobil name but can buy gas from anywhere. Thus Mobil gas will now vary based on where the individual station owners procure their gas. I suspect many Mobil stations will buy cheaper gas with less additives, so beware.

 

Ditto on the Chevron, but I just fillup with 91 . Poor Spike, he must feel unloved.

BTW, if you can find the Techron Concentrate it's fantastic. I do it with every oil change.

 

thats why i am gonna stick with shell

 

Do you know where that information came from? I'd be very surprised if Mobil allowed franchise stations to purchase gasoline from wherever they wanted. Mobil is a premium gasoline brand, with a very strong brand image, and allowing this would certainly damage their reputation.

I'm not saying it's not true, I just think it would be an extremely dumb move by a very smart company, so I'm skeptical.

 

Shell is my prefered gasoline as well. We have a Station on the corner we pass everyday on the way home, Friday Nights whether Molly needs a drink or not we stop and fill-up.

On a recent trip to AZ however I was not always able to find Shell so I fueled at Chevron instead. I was constantly cruising @ 10-over posted mph and had no problems what so ever, just wished Shell was more popular!!

 

my ex GFs dad worked for Mobil, and i can vouch that that statement is true

iva asked and wanted to open my own gas station several years ago

 

I think this thread sets a new all-time record for general mis-information.

- Mark

 

I mostly use QT gas, 91 octain is the highest here in AZ. I never had any problems with it. I use Shell once in a while and have not noticed any difference between the two fuels. I do know that QT is supposed to be a "top tier" fuel. I use it because it's were I get my coffee from each day, so it's more of a convienience thing.

 

thats awesome thanx for all the info

 

I use Shell V-Power because at the station on my way to/from work on Super Tuesday V-Power is the same price as Midgrade - save ~$0.11/gal which makes it cheaper than Costco. I put on a little over 250 miles between Tuesday afternoons, so I top off once a week.

 

Considering that Mobil is a brand of ExxonMobil, that idea is highly suspect. Why would they allow stations carrying their brand name to purchase oil products from anyone other than the parent company? That doesn't make good business sense.

 

i'd be a bit suspect of www.toptiergas.com. nowhere on the site does it provide any background information, contact info, etc... Nadda. Anybody could be running that site. And, it looks like it's using a stock theme from some ISP website wizard. Surely if those big auto makers backing it were involved with it, there would be more to it then that.

 

MINI does have a brochure at their dealers talking about Top Tier and the website. So it is backed by at least MINI / BMW.

 

I guess I'm too much of a skeptic. I'd like to see who is behind the website, how the list is compiled, how often, etc..

 

I'm sure that since it boils down to advertising (not using a Top Tier rated fuel doesn't void your warranty) that there is a fee involved in getting your stations on the list.

Fact is, gasoline is gasoline. The only difference is additives. BMW/MINI says that the additive packages in the fuels offered by those on the top tier list meets their standards. That's about it. Doesn't mean that others don't.

 

still waiting on your "enlightening" words of wisdom

 

I live in an area where there is only 1 Shell station in the county. Not real convenient and a lot of times their pricing is totally out of whack. I normally try to stay with name brands like Sunoco, BP/Amoco, Mobil, Exxon but even then the winter formulation and ethanol have played havoc with both performance and mileage. Recently I noticed that the Lukoil stations were advertising "NO ETHANOL". What the heck, give it a try. Well, after 2 tanks, my mileage has gone from 24-25 to 29+ mpg (hand calculated). Looks like I may have found a new brand.

 

Okay. Gasoline is a commodity. It goes through the same pipes and the exact same gasoline that goes to the Shell station goes to the Chevron station. The only differences are minor variances in the additive packages. And the additive packages are generally competitive with one another and only affect the long-term cleaning properties of the gasoline, not the day-to-day running of the car.

There are some issues with retailers not keeping their tanks clean and the like. But this is specific to the stations, not the brands.

So all this BS about only filling up with one brand because the car runs better is just that - BS.

- Mark

 

^this debate has been long going just like the what type of oil do u use threads found all over numerous car websites

i wish someone would provide real hard data on the not so different fuels found on different retailer stations

without that everyone is going with preference/price and convenience and not actual performance or lack thereof

/end rant

 

This is just more second-hand information, but I did find a post from a guy that handles fuel spills for the EPA. He said that they're unable to "fingerprint" spilled gasoline to determine where it came from, because as soon as the additive package evaporates (which happens very quickly in a spill, since the additives are much more volatile than the base gasoline stock), the actual gasoline stock that's left behind is the same regardless of the source.

So that lends credence to the theory that all gasolines are the same except for the additive package (and octane rating, of course). Unfortunately, I think this is probably the only part of the discussion that everyone seems to agree on already. As far as figuring out what the actual differences are between the various additive packages, I'm at a loss.

 

I work for ExxonMobil and this is not true. ExxonMobil anounced recently that they are getting out of the direct-serve gasoline retail business in the US, both at Mobil and Exxon branded sites. This simply means that ExxonMobil is moving to a distributor-served business model and will not directly own retail sites in the US once they are all sold. Most of the sites will remain Exxon or Mobil branded and the gasoline will remain the same with ExxonMobil proprietary additives. Most Exxon and Mobil sites in the US are already distributor-served so this is really not a big change. There continues to be severe legal consequences for branded dealers who purchase and sell other than Exxon or Mobil gasoline or diesel as Exxon or Mobil products.

See this news story -

http://www.azcentral.com/business/co...xonGas-12.html

 

Danke for clearing that up!