Bill,
    Now I do not recall boston bob say anything about
the world being flat, yet.   Most engine rebuilders
see the worst of what we do to our engines.   I agree
that 87 octane will work well with our vanagon,
however if you advance the engine to get that extra
power you should take boston bob's advise and use the
higher octane.   It may prevent boston bob from seeing
your engine quite so soon.   gary
Date:    Thu, 2 May 2002 12:44:09 -0400
From:    wb6otg <wb6otg@INTREX.NET>
Subject: Re: What Octane Fuel

A stock Vanagon will run fine on regular gas.  Some of
the information
on Boston Bob's web site is just plain wrong.

I think its time to pull this out of the archives and
dust it off:

Here's the story on octane:  At one time (up til the
early '70s?),
there
 were two ways to measure octane, research octane
(based on lab work
with
 the fuel) and another system (I forget the name)
based on tests in an
 actual engine.  The two systems usually give somewhat
different
 numbers.  Most car makers (including VW) specified
research octane,
often
 listed as R.O.N. (Research Octane Number?).  The US
government, in its
 usual wisdom, decided that since people couldn't
agree on a method,
they
 should invent a third one!  So, when the government
started requiring
 that octane be marked on the gas pump, it was
required that the two
 existing methods be averaged to come up with a number
(the fine print
on
 the sticker even reads (R+M)/2.

 So, when VW calls out 91 R.O.N., as the gas flap
sticker on my Jetta
and
 the owner's manual for my Vanagon both do, that is
the same (more or
 less) as the US gas pump number of 87, which is the
usual number for
 regular in most areas.

Bill

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