Fuel for RA28

[Thino]

just a quick question for the gurus that live here!

my RA28 with an 18rg is due for a tune up an i was just wondering what the best fuel to use for the old girl?

[RA35GT]

I use BP Ultimate in mine.

[MWP]

Premium Unleaded (95 RON) or better.

Remember that if you get it tuned for 98, youll always need to run 98.

[pandaah]

id run 98, then at least you can push a couple more degrees timing.. but as MWP said once you tune for bp ultimate.. you cant go back unless you retune

[TRD-12A]

You better off running the 98 in it all the time i run it in my TA22 and it loves it, for the sake of price difference between the 95 and 98 it's like 4 cents.

Tune it with the 98 like everone said you will have keep running the 98 but your better off anyway

[river]

Hi,

You can get away with 95 for 18R-GU and 18R-GUE engines, but 98 is preferable. On the 18R-G and 18R-GR you need 98 - anything less they ping a little and this gets worse as the tune slowly deteriorates.

seeyuzz
river

[MWP]

None of the 18R's (single or twincam) have high enough compression to require 98.

If the engine is pinging on anything lower than 98, its due to fuel or ignition tuning, or spark plugs being too hot.
All of which can be fixed with tuning.

[river]

Hi,

Interesting... I must tell Frank Kleinig that. After he tunes my 18R-G he tells me to run only 98 or it will ping a bit... and it does.

seeyuzz
river

[Thino]

thanks for the info guys, by the looks of it i'll fill her up with 98 before the tune!

[JustCallMeOrlando]

Interesting... I must tell Frank Kleinig that. After he tunes my 18R-G he tells me to run only 98 or it will ping a bit... and it does.

He's probably tuning it for 98RON

[o_man_ra23]

I run Caltex Vortex 98. Appears to be a fairly clean fuel and consistent in quality.

[MWP]

Interesting... I must tell Frank Kleinig that. After he tunes my 18R-G he tells me to run only 98 or it will ping a bit... and it does.

The original engines coming out of Japan never ran 98, so why should they need to now?
I would like to know his reasons as to why they require it.

[mattysshop]

well for one you can increase the base timing...

almost anything can run on normal 91... but you would sacrifice a bit of timing.. or only be able to run the stock base timing.. but if you run a higher octane you can increase your base timing to give it a bit more poke... like really were probly talking about a bit more response, and maybe 5-8hp? but who cares every little bit counts

[roadkill]

Hi,

Interesting... I must tell Frank Kleinig that. After he tunes my 18R-G he tells me to run only 98 or it will ping a bit... and it does.

seeyuzz
river

Hi,

yeah, but isn't urs an 88210 with the highest factory compression

I used to just run standard unleaded and never had any issues. Been doing it on and off for 10 years. All my engines have been the 88250 so not terribly high compression (they were standard) I also found that my car used MORE fuel running the higher octane fuels, it would get about 1k less to the litre. Same went with my standard 2tc. It's all these engines were designed to be run on.

bEn

[o_man_ra23]

Early engines were designed to run leaded fuels, which were seemingly naturally more resistant to detonation.

I used to run 95 premium in my 88230 R-G, and the missus fuelled her up (with 95 ron premium) at a servo that wasn't one of the big name groups once, took until I ran that tank of fuel out and re-filled with another brand before it ran right again.

So fuels can make a big difference on things like engine longevity, idle quality etc, not just power.