I was wondering about the various fuel treatments/additive/stabilizers out there and if I should use one for my 2007 saturn ion. I bought it new, long ago, and it has about 136k miles on it. Getting a new vehicle isnt going to happen any time soon.. or longer.. so iv been trying to care for mine as well as i can. (Which i try to do anyway since i got it.)

A long while back i started with Star Tron treatment when i got my first mower (only on the mower). A couple years ago, i was looking into fuel stabilizers when i was learning about the maintenance for my generators; which was primarily stabil and seafoam at the time. And i recently found out that Lucas made an oil stabilizer (looking into a different issue at the time) which surprised me. Not sure why, but i never thought of an oil stabilizer before.. But it looks like Lucas also makes a fuel/gas treatment as well. ... And then each of those had a few different kinds.

A couple years back I started switching off between two stabilizers with my car, but only maybe once a year for each. So once a year id fill up and add the sta-bil. Run it down. Usually then would fill up regular/nothing added and run that down. Then fill up with seafoam added. (I Dont drive a whole lot now, so it takes a while.)

Technically, once a year, i would also drain the fuel out of my generators which was the high grade gas treated with fuel stabilizer. And replace it with fresh fuel with stabilizer. And then use that drained fuel in my car, not gong to waste it. So i guess the car also ran an additional combined 11 gallons of treated fuel.

Wanting to do what i can for my car, i started wondering about all these different kinds again. And wondering what the best action to take for my cars fuel would be.
Is there a real difference between all of these treatments? Certain ones doing things the others dont? Or better quality then others?
And then, how does one chose which is best for there circumstance (in this case, my car)?

(Links for easy display purposes)
Star Tron: Lowes 1 Ounce/6 gallons
Sta-Bil 360: TS 1oz/5g
Seafoam: AZ - AAP 1oz/1g
Seafoam High Mileage: Lowes 1oz/1g
Lucas Fuel Treatment: AZ - AAP 3oz/10gal
Lucas Fuel Treatment High Mileage: AZ - AAP 1oz/5g

Lucas Fuel System Cleaner: AZ - AAP Label says both 5.25oz/15g and 16oz/30g. Which works out to 2.85oz/1g and 1.875oz/1g. Not sure how that works out the same.
But im guessing this one is just that; a cleaner/maintenance item only with no gas/ethanol stabilizing effect.

Youd think it would be simple.. but apparently not. So here i am.
Thank you for any good knowledge anyone can offer on the subject!

 

I have a 95 SC2 that sat under a tree for two and a half years.
That is the only time I have ever put stabilizer in the gas tank of an automobile. I used stabil. Worked like a charm keeping the vehicle easy to start every few weeks.

I use stabil religiously in gasoline I store at my house for lawn equipment and generator use. I've been going through a stash of gasoline approaching 5 years old. Not missing a beat. I know I'm pushing the limit but I wanted to see how far it would last. I don't think I'm going to get my answer which is fine by me.

The only fuel treatment that goes in my 95 SC2 is a bottle of techron when I remember to buy one, and a tank of 93 brand name gas with detergents every now and then. these are not the original injectors they are about 15 years old and were swapped in as part of diagnostics and left in place.

Long time storage of gas, including sometimes in vehicles/equipment? Stabil. I don't drain any of my lawn equipment or generator at the end of the seasons because the gas is stabilized. Three plus years in my generator, starts on third pull.

95SC2: I stick with brand name gas and a bottle of techron and a tank of 93 now and then. Never had an issue in 30 years

 

I use stabil for my lawn equip and generator as well.

I know i could probably let the genny gas sit for longer then a year, but in my particular case, the generator i have is specifically for powering the AC for one of my animal rooms in a power outage. They cant handle heat. 75f+ and they start risking internal damage or death. So AC is a literal must have. So i dont want to take a chance in an emergency of something going wrong because of old gas. Cycling it every year solves that, and is more likely i will remember to do it as opposed to multiple years. And it doesnt cost much since ill do it when my car is near out of gas anyway. So fill up the car or drain genny and fill up the car, and refill genny. Other then the fact that i use the higher grade fuel in the genny, its the same cost. Just takes a little time.


Im not sure about brand name gas. There is only two gas stations near me really. One is a little no name store. The other is sheetz, a chain gas station/mini store. So iv been using sheetz the last few years.

Techron i hadnt heard of before. Looks like a type of fuel system cleaner. Thats primarily why i was wondering about the fuel treatments/stabilizers. Im not worried about the gas going bad in my car. I was thinking more of the various cleaning/preventing/lubing/etc benefits they claim to have. But they all seem to claim something slightly different.

 

Sheetz 91 meets the Audi spec for approved fuels based on the additive packages. Who knew? BP is closer to me so I'll use that in my Audi and occasionally in my Saturn. Most of today's gasolines have detergent packages in the higher octane versions that probably obsolete things like techron and with direct injection and the extremely high fuel pressures of the newer cars, I don't think the fuel systems are as vulnerable to build up as they used to be. But I could be wrong.

My recommendation is that you do you.
Just slap a tank of 93 sheetz through the ion now and then and it will be fine.