What octane of gas should I use? Would I be wasting my money getting 91? ($1.63 for 91 in Tucson)

 

100








j/k

87 works fine

 

89 or 91 wouldn't do me any better?

 

On the 3800 87 is OK, 89 is better, and 91 is a waste.

 

Our car's engines are designed to use 87 octane. Any higher is useless and can also cause problems because those fuels burn hotter and our engines won't burn it properly.

 

I use 91, but thats in conjunction with my 87 octane power tuning on the HPP3. 87 is best with stock programming.

 

I remember reading in the owners manual that you can use 87 octane but if it starts making pinging noises you should use 89 octane, but that might have been about the LS1.

 

yeah that is for the LS1's. The manual for the 3.8 recommends 87 and discourages anything higher.

 

i agree... i only use regular..... higher octane is harder to burn and you can actually get worse gas mileage..... people say regular is crappy gas and will clog your jets.... well i have 119k miles on my 96 3.8 and she is still running like a champ... now my brake problem is another story...