So Alpha, I know you have a 370Z.
The gas stations where I live apparently only have Regular gas. Would it be okay to fill my G with regular while rationing is in place? What have you been doing?
Haven't driven the Z since. The weather's been awful anyway, so it usually stays in. You can use regular, but you'll have to really, REALLY drive the car slow. I can't use regular because my car is tuned for 93 only. I personally would try to drive out to CT or NJ to find some 91+ premium.
As far as I know, Gs, Zs etc (all that use the VQ35 engine) can freely be filled with regular. Even on the gas tank it says just "use premium for best performance" not that it's mandatory. I'm 99.99% sure the engine has automatic knock adjustment that just lowers the compression a bit automatically when it detects regular so you lose a few HPs and that's it. I've been using regular for a long time in a car with VQ engine with no notable drawbacks whatsoever.
No drawbacks that you know of. In hotter weather, regular gas wrecks havoc inside the motors. Even knock sensors will scale back timing to prevent pinging, but it can only scale back to a finite degree (1-4) and so engine knock will still be occurring, you're just not aware of it. Furthermore, high compression motors will burn through cheap gas at a much, MUCH faster than rate premium - that is a fact. My Audi A6 3.0T is direct injected, with a supercharger - on premium it averages 26-27MPG without fail during a 10 mile drive to my fiance's house. Running on regular, it's struggling to achieve 21MPG, with traffic conditions being actually more lean since less people are on the roads. That's a massive difference and there is absolutely no money savings, either. You'll save $3 filling up regular, but at the expense of 5MPG you've lost 75 miles of driving (15 gallon fill up average). The combined city/hwy average of the Audi is just around 20MPG for us. 75 miles of driving is equal to almost 4 gallons of gasoline ($16).
So you do the math. You spend the extra $3 on premium and extend your driving by 75 miles (a value of $14-16), so filling up regular you end up losing over $10. My uncle filled up his G37 sedan with regular last week...drove 230 miles and the gas light is on. He says he'll easily do 260 miles before the light comes on. So there is some variation. But bottomline...VQs + regular? Poorer fuel efficiency and worst of all, loss of horsepower (dynos show 15WHP as a result of timing adjustment).
I've always heard the opposite with VQs, my wife will freak out if I tell her I put 87 in the G. Then again, I think the owner's manual tells you to use 93 and that isn't a thing in CA.
Owners manual says premium 91+.
