Best fuel to use for bikes?

59408 Views 202 Replies 63 Participants Last post by cruizin, Mar 2, 2014

SpicyNuggets

Discussion Starter · Jan 28, 2013

So boys and girls, just wondering what people put in their bikes and why? Iv been putting 95 in my 250 for the past couple of months now, have a feeling it might have clogged up the fuel injectors. But that's probably from long term use lol
Anywho, tried the 98 and noticed a bit of lag on the bike, wasn't pinging like on the 95... Might try it again next time fill up!
Thoughts?

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FreelancerMG

· #28 · Jul 2, 2013

Even with an ECU tuner, you're still not really going to get the full benefit of a higher octane fuel since you can't change the compression of the engine to take advantage of the higher octane.

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FreelancerMG

· #37 · Jul 3, 2013

I said the exact same thing in the other fuel thread a while ago lol. Some of the high octane users thought I was crazy or lost it. If Cdiz says the same thing, then maybe there is some inkling of truth to it.

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FreelancerMG

· #76 · Aug 18, 2013

my evil twin said:
You might be surprised at how hard I accelerate. It's not so much how you accelerate that ruins gas mileage, it's that you have driving habits that make you use your brakes all the time, thus causing you to have to accelerate all the time.

Accelerating a vehicle from zero to 60mph takes the same amount of energy as lifting it 120.25 ft straight up in the air. That energy is exactly the same no matter how fast or slow you accelerate. The idea that you can get away from producing that energy by slowly sneaking up to a 60 mph cruising speed is just as ridiculous as thinking your house will cost you less if you take out the longest mortgage offered.

I don't think it was mostly about acceleration as it is keeping the RPMs up higher most of the time at a lower gear to keep RPMs higher. Running an engine at higher RPMs takes more fuel as it takes more energy to make the engine run faster than it does slower.

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FreelancerMG

· #79 · Aug 18, 2013

my evil twin said:
I have never understood why BMW optimizes even its slowest and most pedestrian motorcycles for premium fuel.

To me, a high performance motorcycle that burns regular represents higher technology than a motorcycle of equal performance that needs premium.

Cheaper cost. As you say, takes a lot more money and know how to squeeze performance out of an engine without relying on compression than it is to be lazy about it and design the cylinder and head for more compression. Then again, BMW has always done this. Even with their cars they do the same thing. It also has a side effect of making adapting forced induction a pain in the ass as forced induction artificially raises compression even more and would make your required octane go up. That and they may share ECUs or at least their programming, with other models to keep costs down which are setup with timing for a higher octane rating.

I agree with you though, It's much more impressive to me to get as much performance as you can from a lower octane requirement of fuel, rather than take the easier way out and just upping compression and timing. It also tends to be more fuel efficient too.

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FreelancerMG

· #82 · Aug 19, 2013

Jamess said:
On vehicles that have high compression you get better economy out of premium fuels and it works out cheaper overall to buy premium. My sss pulsar was a big one for it, you would get around 1/2 the economy out of the rubbish fuel, and it would drive like a pig in mud the whole time.

The e10 ethanol rubbish is the worst stuff out, I cant remember the figures not but when I did the math it worked out more expensive per km, and I used more fuel, plus the ethanol to get where I was going. All the while having my car drive like a bucket. Family/friends have also done the math on it and came to the same results.

Is there a way to increase the compression ratio on the bike to make use of the proper fuels? I'd take higher performance at the cost of paying for decent fuel any day of the week. Especially considering that worrying about fuel economy on this bike is a laugh anyway.

That being said I didn't buy this bike for fuel efficiency or commuting purposes (thought I do commute every day on it). I bought it because its the fastest bike I'm allowed by my license category and had plans of moving up before I even bought it. Everybody in Aus (QLD at least?) has to do there time on slow bikes nowadays.

If you want to up compression, you could have your engine's pistons and heads reforged and shaped along with adjustments to timing and the ECU to up your compression. Or you could go forced induction.

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FreelancerMG

· #98 · Aug 19, 2013

my evil twin said:
While I don't waste money on octane my bike doesn't need, I do seek out top tier gasoline for my bike and avoid the no-name stations. Shell, Exxon, Chevron, Texaco and others sell top tier gasolines and usually "give away" octane, meaning that the actual octane rating is often slightly higher than listed on the pump.

Considering all gas comes from like 2 or 3 refinery companies and sources, I don't really think there is a huge difference between mom and pop, Walmart/Sam's Club, COSTCO and Texaco, Shell etc. SO long as the facility doesn't look like a dump and the tank cleaning cert shows the tank was drained and cleaned out within the last 3 or so years, it's good.

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FreelancerMG

· #119 · Feb 24, 2014

Hijinks said:
All gas stations are required to post ethanol content on the pump.

Actually it is in the 80's... more so than the 90s in the states. Maybe you should check your own information before spreading more confusion.

Every single gas station I go to 87 and 89 are 10% ethanol while 91+ is 5%.

But you can't use your example either as California has a minimal ethanol requirement for fuel which just happens to be the maximum most engines are turned for. The only way to get ethanol free fuel here is to get much more expensive Nav gas and if you get caught using it in your vehicle, it's a huge fine for using an illegal, unapproved fuel for street use. A great deal of places actually cut more ethanol into their higher octane fuels as ethanol has a higher octane contact than standard fuel does. It's a very easy to to boost octane count without spending more time refining the fuel. Colorado and a few other states from what I saw is more of an exception rather than the rule in this one.

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FreelancerMG

· #130 · Feb 24, 2014 (Edited)

my evil twin said:
I thought Colorado's "regular" was 95 octane because of the high altitude. I see a lot of 96 octane in New Mexico and even in Lubbock TX.
Our pumps only state "contains as much as 10% ethanol" and doesn't break it down by octane.

How can the cops tell you are using nav-gas? Is it dyed red like un taxed diesel?

It's more if CHP or some other authority see you over at the marina pumping gas into your car/bike. Also, if CHP suspect you aren't up to emissions snuff, they can cite you to take your vehicle to get smog tested and you'll automatically fail since the ethanol is a lot cleaner to burn for exhaust emissions, and that's what the testers are calibrated to. Had a friend that failed his smog check multiple times while using ethanol free gas and couldn't figure out why and found out that it was because his fuel was ethanol free and had more particulates parts per million than ethanol based fuel did and was causing him to fail each time. If you fail a CHP cited smog test, you get a nice fat citation for operating a non-road legal vehicle illegally on the road. While motorcycles don't get smog checked in CA, the ordered smog check didn't have language last I read that made motorcycles exempt.

Edit: From what I've been able to scrounge up, marine gas is not dyed and has the road tax added in to the price and you have to use a voucher to reclaim the road tax. Marine diesel is dyed like standard off-road diesel and already has the tax removed. Seems like a bit off a pain in the ass for boaters but in CA it kinda takes on a new light since it's illegal to use non-ethanol based fuels for on road vehicles now. Diesels obviously excluded.

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