Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2001 11:41:10 -0500
Reply-To: Jennifer <ncc876@YAHOO.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Jennifer <ncc876@YAHOO.COM>
Subject: Re: Fw: gas prices
In-Reply-To: <003301c0c8b4$d5c1f2e0$119080d1@hppav>
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At 4:40 AM -0500 4/19/01, Max Wellhouse rearranged electrons to say:
>Unfornately this gentleman has been conditioned to think that $1.29 is cheap
Here it is going for about $1.70 a gallon, perhaps a bit more since I
last drove past the station. I last paid about $1.50 a gallon for 87
octane to fill my Golf. The next day it had jumped by 20 cents a
gallon -- and I had to fill just about the entire tank (I'd let it
get close to redline.) Ouch! Though part of it is the reformulated
gas we use here -- St. Louis has smog problems -- that's still more
than last year.
One alternative that is available is to purchase a car that is built
for 87 octane rather than 89 or 91. I could have had a 1.8 turbo Golf
that has significantly more power, but I chose not to buy it because
of the high gas prices of the time (which weren't as bad last year as
they are this year.) The 1.8T is supposedly higher-mileage, but
real-world reports on VWVortex' Golf 4 forum have shown that this
isn't always true. Same goes for a local friend who owns a GTI VR6
(same car, two doors)... though some of the lost mileage may be due
to, ah, spirited driving. A lot of the folks there like to brag about
street races they won -- come on already...
Many of the high-performance cars out there require more than the
minimum 87 -- the Toyota Avalon requires 89, for example, while VW's
own VR6/1.8T require 91. Some people on the Vortex even feed them 93.
But how many people, especially recent dot-com millionares (before
AMT... I'm *so* glad we didn't take any stock options!) think of
that? Now they're stuck with higher-performance vehicles that take
premium fuel...
By the way, I'm plenty happy with my "2.Slow" Golf. I've trained the
adaptive automatic to be more aggressive with its shifting pattern,
and it works just fine for my driving style.
ObVanContent: What sort of gas can I expect to need in the '90 westy,
for both the 1.9 engine it'll have at first and the 2.1 that'll
probably go in later?
P.S. - Got out of the car at work this morning to discover a Golf II
idling nearby and got cheerfully waved at by the owner. Ah, VW-love.
:) There was a vanagon westy around for a bit, and a yellow old
Beetle, but I haven't seen either of them in a while.
--
-----
Jennifer - ncc876@yahoo.com
... knee-deep in the hoopla ...
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