> That's how we migrated from 95 and 100 octane ratings, and ratcheted down to 87 and 93. People gradually adjusted to the lower quality until the cars could go no further, and here we are.
Crazy. Here in Europe, gas stations have generic 95 and 98 (plus some still carry E5 95 for older cars that don't handle 10% ethanol without issues), premium shit for people with supercars (e.g. Shell V Power, 100 octane) and diesel. Can't remember the last time I saw anything less than 95.
Worth noting that the US[1] and Europe don't measure "octane" the same way, so they're not directly comparable. The US way of measuring typically results in a number 4-6 'octanes' lower than an equivalent European fuel.
So 87 Octane fuel in the US would probably be rated 91-92 in Europe and 93 Octane fuel could be as high as 98-99 Octane under the European system.
What they don't say is that different oil companies started operating the engines in different ways to begin with, and it took many years before standardization was possible at ASTM. And ASTM was much more North-America focused than ASTM International is today.
By that time there were two main methods of conducting the test in the USA, known as the "Research" method and the "Motor" method. These are different ways of operating the same test engine. These antiknock numbers could be quite a bit different from each other, and different oil companies and automotive companies had developed their preferences.
In Europe they had basically started out using the Research method alone and stuck with it for commerce. This value is normally consistently higher than the Motor method.
Full standardization in the USA was a bureaucratic compromise so it ended up (R+M)/2, so if anyone was to do any whining it would be equal whining for all.
Vendors didn't complain, you need two of the reference engines anyway so you can run both methods at the same time:
TIL, thanks. The downside of being non-American on an American-dominated platform is you'll continuously get trapped in Americans running their own standards no one else uses or even knows about... sigh
Crazy. Here in Europe, gas stations have generic 95 and 98 (plus some still carry E5 95 for older cars that don't handle 10% ethanol without issues), premium shit for people with supercars (e.g. Shell V Power, 100 octane) and diesel. Can't remember the last time I saw anything less than 95.