European fuel

[RobertTrivanovic]

Alright so I'm in Europe right now and driving buy gas stations I can't help but notice how right out of the pump they have 95 and 98 octane at all gas stations. I also can't help but notice that (assuming this issue is fuel) deisels don't smoke, or smell at all more then any normal car, everything just burns much cleaner. So why is our (north American) fuel so damn sh*tty?

 

[gunnerthesnowman]

Alright so I'm in Europe right now and driving buy gas stations I can't help but notice how right out of the pump they have 95 and 98 octane at all gas stations. I also can't help but notice that (assuming this issue is fuel) deisels don't smoke, or smell at all more then any normal car, everything just burns much cleaner. So why is our (north American) fuel so damn sh*tty?

Compared to Canada the diesel in the USA is refined more and over seas even more , burns cleaner , more power , better mileage , but it cost more to refine , same goes for the gasoline.

 

[rmscustom]

They're using a different octane rating in Europe which inflates the #.

 

[Jeff C]

There are various calculation methods, RON, MON, and PON or AKI.

RON: (Research Octane Number). Most common fuel used in Europe, Australia and some other Countries. It is determined with measurements of fuel behavior in a variable compression engine. Results are compared with other iso-octane fuels, wish means, compared with other fuel types with equal number of similar octane molecules present, but not the of the same organic compound.

MON: (Motor Octane Number). Determined also with a variable compression engine, but with the fuel already preheated, variable ignition timing and higher RPMs than the RON method. This method is more precise on determining fuel behavior on an loaded engine.

PON or AKI: (Pump Octane Rating or Anti-Knock Index): This is the method used in USA and Canada, expressed as [R+M]/2, wish means RON number plus MON number, divided by 2. In other words, it is the average between both methods above.

Equivalency

So, due to the fact that RON is always from 4 to 5 points higher of its equivalent to PON or AKI, the number conversion between USA and Europe octane ratings will approximately be as follows:

USA (PON) –> Europe (RON)

87 –> 91
89 –> 93
91 –> 95
93 –> 98