Toluene. I've worked with that stuff. NASTY!

 

Yes it is. benzene is worse. I didn't do a very good job of explaining myself. The reason I smelled MTBE for the first time Thursday was because it was residing in the subsurface soil and soil vapor in chemical isolation, in the absence of any other VOC, per my onsite mobile laboratory.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by bayarea408
[B]

have you seen the gas prices, in the LA area or Bay Area?

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by The Raptor
[B]California is phasing out methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE), an octane-enhancing oxygenate gasoline additive and a chlorinated hydrocarbon volatile organic compound (VOC), a suspected carcinogen.

 

All refined gasoline contains many different VOCs. I'm only familiar with California, but my understanding is that most of the rest of the US uses MTBE in the refining process. I can't speak to the tuning/ECU stuff.

 

I'm not sure that I completely understand this whole mtbe thing or not. Is it better to run the 91 octane that we get here in so cal? or the 95 octane that you can get just about anywhere else in the country?

 

As I understand it, from a tuning point of view, you can run a higher compression ratio with higher octane. In Japan we are advised to use "high octain" fuel rather than standard fuel as this avoids "pinking" in the engine, or pre-ignition of the fuel. If you run lower octain the fuel actually combusts fractionally earlier then the completion of the compression stroke.....

(I am sure someone will correct me if I am wrong with that understanding )

 

i dont really think you will seriously notice a difference from 91 octane to 95 octane.
the significance is soo small.

 

You are probably right. Maybe you can't notice the difference but that still doesn't avoid the fact that it's better for your engine.