# Is BP gas OK?



## whoever (Jun 9, 2009)

Somehow I got the impression that most brands are blacklisted for BMW, leaving me just Exxon and Shell. 

But just checked, BP is on toptiergas, so is everyone else with more than one stations.

I also heard the rumors they are all filled by the same tanker. 

What's the truth, nowadays? Thanks


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## need4speed (May 26, 2006)

BP is fine


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## Autoputzer (Mar 16, 2014)

Gas is gas. The differences are the additives and enthanol added right before it goes into the tanker truck on the way to the gas station. Most of the additive packages are made by Lubrizol.

BP and Exxon-Mobil were slow to meet Top Tier requirements.


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## Tom K. (May 10, 2008)

Have been using the cheapest off brand 93 octane for nearly 20 years in 5 Bimmers, a Beemer and a Porsche with absolutely no problems - other than a heavier wallet.

Tom


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## M5Fed (Sep 7, 2014)

Way too much into advertisements....agree with Auto, gas is gas so stop paying more for nothing!


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## Autoputzer (Mar 16, 2014)

M5Fed said:


> Way too much into advertisements....agree with Auto, gas is gas so stop paying more for nothing!


The whole Top Tier Gas story is a sort of a soap opera. The manufacturers (BMW, GM, M-B, VW, Honda, Toyota) were having trouble with clogged injectors causing warranty claims. They weren't happy with Big Oil's (specifically the American Petroleum Institute's) proposed solution, which was to only add more additives to premium grades of gas. Top Tier requires all grades of that brand to have sufficient additives to pass the tests.

Tom K might be fine with generic 93 AKI gas, since it might have more additives than the generic 87 AKI gas at the same station. Also, these problems become apparent with more miles. If you lease and get a new car every 36 months, you're less likely to have a clogged injector than somebody who keeps cars 100k miles.

The lack of additives thing is real, though. It was so bad back in the 1980's that GM called all the oil companies to a meeting, demanded more additives, and threatened to send lists of good gas and bad gas to GM customers. They had the same trouble with motor oil, and started requiring diesel-rated oil for all of their gasoline engines. Lubrizol is also the industry leader in lubricant additives. Lubrizol's saw their demand and stock value go through the roof. Lubrizol was recently bought out by Berkshire-Hathaway (Warren Buffet).

I went to engineering school and started my career near what is now a Siemens fuel injector factory and engineering laboratory in Virginia back in the 1980's. A classmate and a neighbor were both engineers there. They both would tell anybody who would listen to stay with name brand gas. The EPA got involved in regulating additives since then. But, the Top Tier manufacturers are still not happy with the EPA's minimum required level of additives.

Costco is actually Top Tier gas. Walmart/Sam's Club (Murphy brand).... ehhh... not so much. Citgo also doesn't make the Top Tier grade. Neither does Sunoco.

www.toptiergas.com

The website is conspicuously missing information about who runs it. A friend did the research and found that it is owned by one of the gasoline retailers.


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## Doug Huffman (Apr 25, 2015)

Autoputzer said:


> www.toptiergas.com
> 
> The website is conspicuously missing information about who runs it. A friend did the research and found that it is owned by one of the gasoline retailers.


Whois: toptiergas.com SAVANTlab.com


> Savant, Inc. is part of the Savant Group. The Savant Group is comprised of four independent corporations operating within the lubricant industry. Customers include petroleum and additive producers, small and large lubricant blenders, and original equipment manufacturers. All four Savant Group companies are ISO 9001 certified and actively participate in industry organizations involved with the advancement and quality control of lubrication such as the ASTM, SAE, ILSAC, and STLE.





> Top Tier Detergent Gasoline is a performance specification and trademark designed by several major automakers - BMW, General Motors, Honda, Toyota, Mercedes-Benz,and Volkswagen Group (as of 2014).
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top_Tier_Detergent_Gasoline


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## whoever (Jun 9, 2009)

Autoputzer said:


> Costco is actually Top Tier gas. Walmart/Sam's Club (Murphy brand).... ehhh... not so much. Citgo also doesn't make the Top Tier grade. Neither does Sunoco.


I swear when I started the thread, I saw Sunoco on the tt list. That's the only one I used besides Shell and Exxon over the years. And lots of people said Costco is not only low quality but also low MPG :tsk:

Sounds like it's all hype and no truth. I should just stop worrying and use whatever nearest and cheapest named brand.

Thanks for everyone's opinion.


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## Oaker55 (Mar 7, 2014)

I'm going to premise this statement that I normally only use BP or Shell gas but recently on a trip to the Minneapolis to visit family, we were in need of gas and couldn't find a BP or Shell station. I got my trusty Gas Buddy app out to see if I could find any TT gas close by as now we were low on gas from looking for Shell or BP. I noticed that a local convenient chain that had just moved into our area at home was listed on the app and it indicated that they had TT fuel. This surprised me but there was one close by and we found it and filled up. Since then, I made an observation at home that Shell is raping it's customers by charging over a dollar more per gallon for their premium fuel over their regular fuel. I refuse to pay that so I have been going to BP more regularly for gas which in our area has about a $.60 spread. I was checking on Gas Buddy the other day and have noticed that the local convenient chain that I mentioned before does NOT have TT fuel in our area which I found interesting. I have also noticed that a lot of the stations are showing a larger spread on the cost of gas between regular and premium grades. I've seen spreads anywhere for $.30 to $1.10.


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## Autoputzer (Mar 16, 2014)

Sunoco's good reputation came from their sale of 94 AKI gas, and their blending pumps where the customer could select the AKI they wanted. Sunoco stopped offering 94 AKI when MTBE was banned by most states. Oh, and they sponsor NASCAR.

Hype is why BMW, M-B, VW, GM, Toyota, and Honda came up with TTG. A crucial part of the TTG standard is that all grades of a retailer's gas must meet the standard.

I keep cars 100k+ miles. So, I worry about valve deposits, and clogged injectors, and use TTG. I also use synthetic oil in everything. A lot of people think synthetic oil is also hype.


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## Autoputzer (Mar 16, 2014)

Oaker55 said:


> I'm going to premise this statement that I normally only use BP or Shell gas but recently on a trip to the Minneapolis to visit family, we were in need of gas and couldn't find a BP or Shell station. I got my trusty Gas Buddy app out to see if I could find any TT gas close by as now we were low on gas from looking for Shell or BP. I noticed that a local convenient chain that had just moved into our area at home was listed on the app and it indicated that they had TT fuel. This surprised me but there was one close by and we found it and filled up. Since then, I made an observation at home that Shell is raping it's customers by charging over a dollar more per gallon for their premium fuel over their regular fuel. I refuse to pay that so I have been going to BP more regularly for gas which in our area has about a $.60 spread. I was checking on Gas Buddy the other day and have noticed that the local convenient chain that I mentioned before does NOT have TT fuel in our area which I found interesting. I have also noticed that a lot of the stations are showing a larger spread on the cost of gas between regular and premium grades. I've seen spreads anywhere for $.30 to $1.10.


The spread depends on market conditions. If you're in an affluent area with a lot of premium gas guzzling BMW's, M-B's, Porsche's, etc., the spread is higher. If you're in a blue collar, no collar, or wife beater t-shirt area, the spread is usually a lot lower.

The lowest spread I've seen was in Daphne, Alabama in February, $0.24/gallon. It was so small that I: took a picture, and filled up with 93 AKI. The spread in my area is almost uniformly $0.45/gallon. I usually blend 1/3 87 AKI and 2/3 93 AKI to get the 91 AKI required for my cars. I was 140 miles from home, near the end of a business trip. I always fill up at the start and end of business trips to keep my cost accounting straight. With pure 93 AKI, I filled up with pure 87 AKI when I got home. Daphne is a well-heeled suburb of Mobile. But, the interchange where the gas station was is one that catered to travelers (lots of hotels, motels, gas stations, and restaurants). I guess that Shell station made up the difference in volume, and actually advertising the price of premium. A lot of stations now only show the price of regular and diesel on their signs.

I always buy TTG. But, I am also motivated by price. It's not the money, but more my life-long quest to reward good behavior and punish bad behavior.


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## Oaker55 (Mar 7, 2014)

Autoputzer said:


> The spread depends on market conditions. If you're in an affluent area with a lot of premium gas guzzling BMW's, M-B's, Porsche's, etc., the spread is higher. If you're in a blue collar, no collar, or wife beater t-shirt area, the spread is usually a lot lower.
> 
> The lowest spread I've seen was in Daphne, Alabama in February, $0.24/gallon. It was so small that I: took a picture, and filled up with 93 AKI. The spread in my area is almost uniformly $0.45/gallon. I usually blend 1/3 87 AKI and 2/3 93 AKI to get the 91 AKI required for my cars. I was 140 miles from home, near the end of a business trip. I always fill up at the start and end of business trips to keep my cost accounting straight. With pure 93 AKI, I filled up with pure 87 AKI when I got home. Daphne is a well-heeled suburb of Mobile. But, the interchange where the gas station was is one that catered to travelers (lots of hotels, motels, gas stations, and restaurants). I guess that Shell station made up the difference in volume, and actually advertising the price of premium. A lot of stations now only show the price of regular and diesel on their signs.
> 
> I always buy TTG. But, I am also motivated by price. It's not the money, but more my life-long quest to reward good behavior and punish bad behavior.


The spread in our area has historically been $.30 at convenient stores to $.60 at Shell/BP. I didn't drive for a month because of surgery and when I started again, I stopped and filled the tank and as I was pumping I noticed the dollar spread and wondered what the heck was going on. Just seems to me that someone is getting greedy as all of the Shell stations in this area are owned by the same distributor.


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## Autoputzer (Mar 16, 2014)

I'd gladly pay an extra $1.00/gallon if it came with my area being purged of the dregs.


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## drrpm (Feb 9, 2010)

I have not had a problem with clogged fuel injectors since about 1990, when it was a fairly common problem. Gas is gas sums it up. I wouldn't worry about gas from anywhere except some off brand low volume place.


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## Autoputzer (Mar 16, 2014)

drrpm said:


> I have not had a problem with clogged fuel injectors since about 1990, when it was a fairly common problem. Gas is gas sums it up. I wouldn't worry about gas from anywhere except some off brand low volume place.


Modern fuel injectors are piezoelectric (very fast on-off cycles), pulsed (sometimes multiple pulses per cycle), and many have multiple orifices (several little holes instead of one big hole). So, they're more susceptible to clogging than the injectors back in the 1990's (many of which were continuous flow). Also, ethanol causes solids to form in gasoline, which can be dissipated by sufficient fuel additives.

I'm going to trust the engineers at GM, Toyota, Honda, BMW, VW, and M-B on this one, and stick with TTG, especially since I keep cars 100k miles. These manufacturers came up with this standard because they were having warranty claims caused by insufficient additives in gasoline that met the EPA minimum requirements for additives.


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## marcozandrini (Feb 13, 2014)

Autoputzer said:


> I'm going to trust the engineers at GM, Toyota, Honda, BMW, VW, and M-B on this one, and stick with TTG, especially since I keep cars 100k miles. These manufacturers came up with this standard because they were having warranty claims caused by insufficient additives in gasoline that met the EPA minimum requirements for additives.


What he said!!!!!! Now, I won't buy BP gas for moral reasons after the company's Gulf of Mexico fiasco.


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## drrpm (Feb 9, 2010)

My 1986 IROC Camaro was the only car I owned that had trouble with clogged fuel injectors and the last episode was 1990. Since then I have owned 10 more fuel injected cars and trucks, 4 of which exceeded 100 K miles and had no problems with the fuel injection systems. The quality of gasoline and detergent additives is much higher today than in the late 80's and early 90's so there is not much to worry about as far as gas goes.


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## Autoputzer (Mar 16, 2014)

marcozandrini said:


> What he said!!!!!! Now, I won't buy BP gas for moral reasons after the company's Gulf of Mexico fiasco.


I live a couple of blocks from the Gulf. We had a few droplets here, but that was it. A lot of scam artists got rich over the event though. There were a lot of "FUBP" bumper stickers around here at that time.


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## HugH (Apr 26, 2006)

Oaker55 said:


> The spread in our area has historically been $.30 at convenient stores to $.60 at Shell/BP. I didn't drive for a month because of surgery and when I started again, I stopped and filled the tank and as I was pumping I noticed the dollar spread and wondered what the heck was going on. Just seems to me that someone is getting greedy as all of the Shell stations in this area are owned by the same distributor.


Shell probably has the most extensive advertising program of all the brands. Long time ago their pumps proclaimed that their premium gas had the most cleaning additives. EPA challenged them to show proof. They had to change their advertising as they were using the same additives in all three of their octane gas, as required by law.

Anyway, someone has to pay for all that BS...oops, advertising.


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## Campfamily (Sep 20, 2010)

Autoputzer said:


> The spread depends on market conditions. If you're in an affluent area with a lot of premium gas guzzling BMW's, M-B's, Porsche's, etc., the spread is higher. If you're in a blue collar, no collar, or wife beater t-shirt area, the spread is usually a lot lower.
> 
> The lowest spread I've seen was in Daphne, Alabama in February, $0.24/gallon. It was so small that I: took a picture, and filled up with 93 AKI.


Out here in California, the spread between regular and premium is almost always $0.20 per gallon; some stations might increase it to $0.25 per gallon, but that's a rarity. Mid-grade is, as expected, usually about $0.10 more per gallon.

Earlier this week I was on a business trip in Boston, and I was very surprised to see that the price spread was much more than what I am used to, if I remember right, it was about $0.70 per gallon. All of a sudden makes the question of "do I really need to use Premium gas" a lot easier to understand.

Keith


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## Autoputzer (Mar 16, 2014)

Campfamily said:


> Out here in California, the spread between regular and premium is almost always $0.20 per gallon; some stations might increase it to $0.25 per gallon, but that's a rarity. Mid-grade is, as expected, usually about $0.10 more per gallon.
> 
> Earlier this week I was on a business trip in Boston, and I was very surprised to see that the price spread was much more than what I am used to, if I remember right, it was about $0.70 per gallon. All of a sudden makes the question of "do I really need to use Premium gas" a lot easier to understand.
> 
> Keith


Yeah, but your premium is 91 AKI. Most of the rest of the US gets AKI 93. I cut my 93 AKI with 1/3 87 AKI to get down the 91 AKI the car requires... and save about $2.50/tank. I like savings the money... like this guy. :tsk:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gx-VcPdna0M


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## grafxguy (Aug 18, 2015)

I use 93 Sonoco in my '05 530i. Performance and mpg is great. Low end average is about 435 mpt and when I am on the highway more I am pushing about 585.


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## Campfamily (Sep 20, 2010)

Autoputzer said:


> Yeah, but your premium is 91 AKI. Most of the rest of the US gets AKI 93. I cut my 93 AKI with 1/3 87 AKI to get down the 91 AKI the car requires... and save about $2.50/tank. I like savings the money... like this guy. :tsk:
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gx-VcPdna0M


Good point. Hadn't noticed the rest of the country could get a higher octane rating than what was available in California. I had noticed that some states, specifically Colorado and New Mexico, had lower ratings than we had in California; regular gas was 85, mid was 87. Didn't notice what the high was, as I was either driving a rental car (lowest price gas always) or my wife's Nissan Armada (87 octane, anything higher is a waste).

Keith


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## Alpine300ZHP (Jan 31, 2007)

Campfamily said:


> Out here in California, the spread between regular and premium is almost always $0.20 per gallon; some stations might increase it to $0.25 per gallon, but that's a rarity. Mid-grade is, as expected, usually about $0.10 more per gallon.
> 
> Earlier this week I was on a business trip in Boston, and I was very surprised to see that the price spread was much more than what I am used to, if I remember right, it was about $0.70 per gallon. All of a sudden makes the question of "do I really need to use Premium gas" a lot easier to understand.
> 
> Keith


Wow. Here in South Florida the spread is in line with Boston. Here it is anywhere from .50 cents to .90 cents spread from regular to premium. Top Tier or not, the spread remains in that range.


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## Tom K. (May 10, 2008)

Campfamily said:


> I had noticed that some states, specifically Colorado and New Mexico, had lower ratings than we had in California; regular gas was 85, mid was 87.
> Keith


This is because octane requirements decrease at higher altitudes.

As the current spread in MD between 87 and 93 varies from about $.35 to .80 per gallon, I have no problem with running an occasional tankful of 87 as BMW specs 87 minimum and 91 preferred for my 328i.

Tom


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## Dave 20T (Apr 7, 2013)

Gas threads are common, but some criteria that I use include:

1. Is it gas? Not diesel. (ha ha, but true)
2. Is it the correct octane?
3. Is the price ok?
4. Is the station safe or scary?
5. Is there enough turnover so that the gas is probably fresh?
6. Is there not a tanker filling the station now? (rumors that it stirs up debris in the tank)

After those criteria, then the brand matters. Many years ago, BMW said that there were engine deposits. Top Tier advertises as having high anti-deposit additives, which I believe. However, Top Tier also requires ethanol, which isn't too good. Therefore, Top Tier is not a guarantee of quality.

I do believe you can improve store brand gas, some of which has minimal anti-deposit additives by adding about 1 oz. of concentrated Techron per tank. A 20 oz. bottle of Techron should then last 20 fill ups.


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## whoever (Jun 9, 2009)

Good to know I have more choices. Somewhere northern New Jersey, BP is like 30-50 cents cheaper than Shell/Mobile on average. But I guess top tier means nothing since I have never heard a single good word about Costco gas.

I was told you only supposed to use additive right before oil changes and flush them out asap. No?



Dave 20T said:


> Gas threads are common, but some criteria that I use include:
> 
> 1. Is it gas? Not diesel. (ha ha, but true)
> 2. Is it the correct octane?
> ...


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## Autoputzer (Mar 16, 2014)

Costco has only recently become TTG. Gas is gas. It's the additive packages that make the difference.


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## whoever (Jun 9, 2009)

Autoputzer said:


> Costco has only recently become TTG. Gas is gas. It's the additive packages that make the difference.


Every single post about Costco says they result in low MPG :dunno:


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