Stupid car.

[elfs]

This afternoon, after my gas tank had fallen below 50%, the warning light came on: "Service Engine Soon." Omaha, being practical, advised me not to freak out but to do what I always did, and feed the thing a bottle full of line cleaner (Techron) and some high-octane gas. Sure enough, with the tank at 20%, I took it in and did as she suggested, also checking the oil and topping it off, and within an hour the light went out.

My car is way too sensitive to cheap gas. Apparently, that's not uncommon with older Ford Escorts (mine's a '97), but I really, really can't afford to have the thing have trouble. Not now.

Comments

[solarbird]

My Car Talk pattern-matcher says "oxygen sensor needs replacing."

[sirfox.livejournal.com]

Seconded. Those things seem to be the first thing to fail in a lot of cars. Because they're made to sense oxygen, they can corrode, iirc.

[elfs.livejournal.com]

I've had it replaced twice. It's not the problem. The problem is cheap gas tends to deposit on the valves, and they "stick" momentarily. At some point, when there's enough crap on them, the computer starts to record thousands of transient misfires every second or so, and the light comes on.

The Ford guy told me I could either have a very expensive headcleaning done, or just use high-quality gas (he personally recommended Chevron) with a bottle of Techron every other tank. The latter is the incantation that works.

I think in this case, it was just a tank of bad gas that made the car sensitive, and going back to the magic formula worked fine.

[lisakit.livejournal.com]

There are engine gunk cleaners that you can add to your fuel too. Have you ever tried one? Don't know if any of them would be cheaper than the Techron (a branded product) or work as well, but it could be worth going into Schuck's or something and looking at what's available.

[elbowfetish.livejournal.com]

My '98 Escort's computer is programmed for 87 octane and that's always worked as well as 94 octane for me. My '91 Escort was always happy with 87 octane too. I don't notice a difference with up to 10% ethanol.

I personally stick to brands with consistently high quality, and stations with clean tanks. Some of the higher octane gasolines here come with cleaners mixed in, which could help if cleaning was warranted.

If you know the incantation that makes your car happy, keep the sympathetic magic going. Swing the rubber chicken around your head, and crack the whip.

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

The 2000 Escort I have out in California I picked up...

[wolfwings.livejournal.com]

...because the previous owner hadn't respected the check engine light and using clean gas. They had a valve stick enough it got whacked by a piston. Apparently it's more than the valves get gunk on them easilly, the valve guides aren't very good at guiding the valve to only move in one dimension, so they get bound up at odd angles far too easilly. Picked it up for a song, $1800 for a car that's mint condition. But yeah, stick to good fuel unless you've got aftermarket valve guides in any 3rd-gen or later Escort, they'll stick bad enough to cause nasty surprises otherwise.

All Gas starts out the same

[(Anonymous)]

All gas starts out the same, it made to meet a ASME? spec.

Where I live we have two refineries, and you see all the brands loading at both refineries, they load up with generic gas, and then the driver dumps in a container of the brands "Magic Potion" and off to the station they go.

I have also seen a truck unload at one station and then cross the street and unload at a competing station.

And if you think it's pipeline gas, guess what, it a commingled system, if brand X puts in 100,000 gallons of unleaded (Texas), they then get to take 100,000 gallons out of the pipeline anywhere along it's route (Missouri, Kentucky, New York, etc.).

And that "bad batch" of gas? A lot of that gets sold to the gasohol people who use it to denature the alcohol before shipping.