Dont put 87 in your gas tank!

jefry147 said:

I recently just bought my WRX. I accidentally filled the tank a couple times with 87 and im hoping i didnt ruin anything.

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Highly doubtful any harm occurred. If you do find yourself with 87 in the tank, just take it easy and don't hammer on the throttle. The minimum octane for the WRX is 91.

Depending on the Honda it probably recommended 92 as well

Top it up with the highest octane gas available, burn some gas and then top it up again with the highest octane available again.

Your car is able to compensate for a minor deviation in octane, but it's not something you want to do long term and it's not a good idea to beat on the car while you've got <91 in the tank.

Add some octane booster, then top off with 93 or 91 to help mix it in the tank.

I would personally recommend an ECU reset after you're sure you've burned through the bad gas. The ECU is capable of retarding the timing in order to avoid engine damage, so it's very unlikely you damaged anything, but now even if you do have good gas in it, you most certainly are not taking advantage of the power even your stock ECU is set up for.

Add the octane booster and take it very easy and avoid putting the engine under any heavy load until you empty the tank of the bad juice.

Thats why you read the owners manual or at least the sticker on the fuel door that says "premium fuel only".

I wouldnt waste your time with the octane booster. In most cases with the octane booster it only raises .1, so if you had 87 in it and added the booster it would be 87.1. There are a few good ones but most are crap. You can read the thread I had about octane booster here. http://www.clubwrx.net/forums/engine-modifications/134316941-fuel-octane-question.html. Just refill the tank with the proper fuel, wait till your sure your full with the right fuel then reset the ecu. I did the same thing. It was a dumb idea I had. I didnt hurt the car, but it ran like crap.

I only use Sunoco Ultra 93 in my car but was chatting with a friend of mine recently about the wrx and sti because his wife daily drove an 04 wrx for 6 years. I mentioned about paying more for gas and he said she used 87 in the car since new and they never had a problem. I was really surprised they never had a problem with the car.

I live in Oregon where pumping your own gas is verboten.

One time after I clearly specified "Premium" to the attendant, he started filling it with Regular. I was copying my mileage data into my logbook so I didn't notice until 10 gallons had already been put in.

Man, did that attendant get a piece of my mind! His response: "Well your car isn't all that fancy anyway, it probably doesn't need it." He gave me a free jug of octane booster, but that did nothing.

My car ran like a dog for that tank, and now I watch every attendant like a hawk.

Eric05mx said:

she used 87 in the car since new and they never had a problem. I was really surprised they never had a problem with the car.

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You could potentially be safe doing that for that long; depends on how they drove. If they never ventured too far into boost (i.e. kept it to low single digits) it wouldn't be an issue, but how can you not venture too far into boost?

mudferret said:

You could potentially be safe doing that for that long; depends on how they drove. If they never ventured too far into boost (i.e. kept it to low single digits) it wouldn't be an issue, but how can you not venture too far into boost?

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Well, if his wife drives anything like my wife, the car would be in no danger of double-digit boost levels. My wife gives me "the look" whenever I hammer down on freeway onramps and such, and hates the boost surge feeling. If she could drive a stick, I'd imagine she'd keep the revs as low as possible, and probably wouldn't notice any performance difference between 92 and 87 octane...

I know someone who's running a HTA68 on 87 right now. He's detuned it to 6psi, and a lot less timing I'm sure, since he lost 3rd gear. Prior to losing 3rd gear he'd tweak the tune so he could run 90 in the winter. Either way 90 is no longer available here, one retailer was selling 90, 92, and 94, thanks to changes in refinery requirements they're now only able to sell 87, 89, 94.

There is no need for a panic storm.

Manufacturers make your car dummy proof and they understand people may do this...otherwise you'd hear more about people with blown motors on factory cars. Anytime the knock sensor senses any excessive pinging / knocking it will automatically reduce ignition timing which on the users end will make for less power and possibly worse gas mileage at worse. There have been found that some factory cars are just tuned horribly and even following the fuel octane requirements were still preducing 4-6 degrees of knock retard.

Rambo said:

I live in Oregon where pumping your own gas is verboten.

One time after I clearly specified "Premium" to the attendant, he started filling it with Regular. I was copying my mileage data into my logbook so I didn't notice until 10 gallons had already been put in.

Man, did that attendant get a piece of my mind! His response: "Well your car isn't all that fancy anyway, it probably doesn't need it." He gave me a free jug of octane booster, but that did nothing.

My car ran like a dog for that tank, and now I watch every attendant like a hawk.

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quickly grab the back of his neck and shove his face toward the fuel door that has the sticker "premium fuel only" then make him drink the octane booster.

T0rque said:

quickly grab the back of his neck and shove his face toward the fuel door that has the sticker "premium fuel only" then make him drink the octane booster.

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lol

T0rque said:

quickly grab the back of his neck and shove his face toward the fuel door that has the sticker "premium fuel only" then make him drink the octane booster.

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:rotfl:


Today (same station, actually), I was filling up, and when the pump finished, the nozzle fired itself out of the filler hole and smashed into the gas pump. I have no idea how that would happen, but thankfully it cleared my quarter panel and just got a few drops of gas below the cap. I think this station is cursed, either that or my subie was plotting revenge for previous events...
wrmad: