A question for the technical folks:
Christmas day, I was in need of fuel and (horror of horrors) the only station open was an ARCO. So I filled the tank with ARCO premium and drove 30 miles or so without any issues. The next day, after about 25 miles of freeway driving, I noticed a ticking sound from the engine compartment at idle. Slightly pushing the gas stopped the noise. The car seems to run fine, but with noticably less power than usual. I'm guessing the ticking sound is knocking, but it doesn't sound like the knocking I'm familiar with on older carburator engines - that's more of a rattle or clank - this is a ticking that seems correlated with engine speed.
I plan to put "real" gas in the car when I run it down to 1/4 or so. I expect it will correct this issue or it will be in to the dealer. I have 13000 miles on it so far without any issues at all, so it's a pretty distinct correlation between putting ARCO in it and getting a peculiar engine sound.
Anybody have any comments? Presumably the engine has knock sensors that retard the timing appropriately, but would I hear this sound even if they are working properly? Perhaps they've retarded the timing as far as they can, but the engine still knocks.
Yes, I know.... Don't use ARCO!
Thanks,
Torky