It must still depend where you live as far as EPA standards and blends are concerned.
Back in the '90's is when they really got to rockin and rollin with that designer blend anti-pollution gasoline. If there were so many people that lived in your county, that helped dictate the severity of the designer gas. If industry in your county was tabbed with certain levels of pollution, that also dictated the severity of the designer gas. Back then and in the early 2000's, I lived and owned in Romeoville, Will County, IL and got murdered by that special designer anti-pollution blend. First, there were towns that exceeded 100,000 like Joliet, so designer gasoline for that. Then there was a designer gasoline refinery in Lockport/Romeoville that was a heavy polluter itself, so another level of designer gasoline for it and the three fossil power plants, and other industries. Here are some examples of that special designer gasoline...I had a mower that I had to clean the carburator after every three mows. No joke. New when I got it, mowed the grass up to three times, mower would run so bad would have to take the carb off and clean it. Got so mad after a couple of seasons of that, that I ran down to Home Depot in Joliet to buy a new mower. The guy asked me what I had in mind, and I told him my problem. He told me that he would be glad to sell me a new mower like he did many others, take my $$$, but my real problem was the designer anti-pollution gumming up my carb, most noticeable on small engines. I didn't buy a new mower from him, but instead cleaned my carb one last time, and began importing my gasoline from my other home in rural Indiana where the population was down and was few industries. Never had another problem ever with my mower gumming up and that was over several seasons. The same with both of my Harleys. Fill them up in or around Will County, and they would spit and pop and carry on badly, so I imported premium from home in Indiana as well, and they ran great. But with them I had to compromise because riding the roads of Illinois went through gas and required fillups, but the last fillups before crusing home, I would fill up with just enough to get me home, then fill the tanks with non-designer anti-pollution gasoline, and never had problems. I hear that isn't true anymore, but I know that it is because my small mowers for trimming still have no problems with the gas in rural Indiana or lower Michigan, and I know that they haven't gotten away from that lousy designer gas in much more densely and polluted Lake County, IN or anywhere boardering the Chicagoland suburbs or collar counties. To be honest with you, I'm surpised that gasoline even lights without a blow torch is so lousy burning. But, they say that its good for the environment, so good as a matter of fact that it hurts performance and economy, ultimately milage, and thats why you have to use much more of it than non-designer blends, and burning more of that pollutes much, much, much less in the same way that global warming now causes blizzards to hear it told by politicians and scientists that get federal money to pay their mortgages, so they "depend on global warming" so that they can keep generating reports that cause more funding to pay their mortgages. The bigger the report, the more funding, the bigger the home and payment.
Anyway, what kind of gas you use depends on where you live. I use premium in everything gasoline powered, except the push mowers for trimming, but its a toss up. Premium gets me better performance, but costs on an average of 20 cents per gallon. Regular costs 20 cents less per gallon, but the performance and economy aren't there. I use premium and go for performance and angering tree huggers, which generally is a good performance in itself.
Good luck.
Mark
