TTAC Commentator Golden2husky writes:
I have a Piston Slap question for you. Does anybody out there in the main office (or any of the B&B perhaps) recall “Shell of the Future” gasoline. I grew up on Long Island, New York and in the early ’70s Shell introduced a gasoline called “Shell of the Future” which was just unleaded gas. This fuel was dispensed from a baby blue pump and was sold a few years before the national roll-out of lead free gas. My dad tried a couple of tanks of it, but the car detonated due to a too low octane rating, or so he said. I asked him just recently and he clearly recalls it. Nobody else seems to recall this product. I have Googled and Binged this to no avail. So, am I living a dream?’
Sajeev answers:
Automotive history is littered with ideas like “Shell of the Future” gasoline. When the “science” of R&D and marketing come together, the by-product is sometimes half-baked ideas with a limited shelf life. Here are some of my favorites, in no particular order:
Amoco’s line of “clear” gasolines in the 1990s
The 1956 Dodge La Femme (Sassy!)
“NO SKID” treaded tires from the early 1900’s
Aftermarket CHMSL (center high mounted stop light) conversion kits from 1986
Anything from a vintage JC Whitney catalog
The blatant greenwashing of Ford’s thirsty TwinForce V6, a la EcoBoost.Since I wasn’t even born in the early 1970s, I’m keeping my mouth shut about your particular question. Off to you, Best and Brightest.
[Send your queries to mehta@ttac.com]
I dunno about that, but I read recently that Shell and a some car manufacturers have recently collaborated on a new formulation of gasoline, supposedly better quality. Has more detergents or something. I cant find anything about that either.
Gas from a baby blue pump! That would have been great.
I would think Shell would have a corporate archive or some sort of OLD people working there that may remember this. Did you ever try contacting the company?
I wasn’t born until after 1980, sorry I can’t help.
Amoco had “white gas” and it was supposed to clean out your engine. Cleaned your wallet out too. I saw a car at a car show with No Skid tires. The tire tread had the words No Skid.
Today we have nitrogen gas, techron, and a host of other additives that will grow your hair back as well as turn your VW into a Porsche.
Shell now advertises that its gasoline has Nitrogen. I thought Nitrogen was something my wife puts on her flowers. Or is Nitrogen like that stuff from bulls that gets put on flowers?
I am probably about the same age as Golden2husky. I remember Super Shell with Platformate (I still don’t know what the heck Platformate was), I remember a singing rocker arm assembly, I remember a tiger in your tank and Sunoco 260. And, I THINK I remember something about gasoline “in the blue pump”. but that’s all I got.
“Shell and a some car manufacturers have recently collaborated on a new formulation of gasoline … ”
Maybe you are thinking of the Top Tier gasoline approval/marketing program ????
http://www.toptiergas.com/
Chevron, Texaco, Conoco, Phillips 66, 76 & Shell are some of the bigger name which are part of the Top Tier group. Whether or not this means their fuels are in fact better than Exxon/Mobil or others I do not know.
Too bad that Model T isn’t sitting on NO SKIDs.
I am old enough to remember the Sinclair dinosaur (we even got free dinosaur-shaped green soap once!!), but I don’t remember anything about “Shell of the Future”, but I was down in Texas at the time.
PS- I suspect that this question is really just a subversive attempt to virally introduce the verb “Binged” into the wild…
Shell of the Future ad from the St. Petersburg Times, 10/1/1970, page 5-B:
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=888&dat=19701001&id=Xc0NAAAAIBAJ&sjid=p3UDAAAAIBAJ&pg=3932,274845
No. but I do remember Sunoco had gas pumps in the 60’s and 70’s that you could select five gas grades (it just mixed high and low octane gas). Sunoco 260 was the top grade if I remember. One gas station here in Denver still sells “white” gas without ethanol and a “super premium” for high compression or race engines. Pretty expensive stuff.
Twotone
I recall a mid-70s Shell product that was a mid-grade unleaded. It worked fine in my 1974 Corolla. Octane was somewhere between the leaded Regular and Super grades.
We used to buy “white gas” from the local Sohio (much later became BP) to use as fuel for our gasoline blowtorch. On the farm in the winter it got used a lot to thaw stuff out.
Don’t remember “Shell of the Future,” but a I don’t get the point their current Nitrogen gas ads. By itself, Nitrogen is a (mostly) inert gas, that doesn’t combust or explode.
Various nitrogen compounds (such as Sodium Nitrate) can for gunpowder or fertilizer, but there is no mention of anything like this in the ads, just Nitrogen.
@jpcavanaugh: “I remember Super Shell with Platformate (I still don’t know what the heck Platformate was)…”
I knew that growing up near a large gasoline-refining plant would one day pay off!
Platformate is what results when naphtha is made into a high-octane component of gasoline, through a catalytic process involving platinum. The word is actually a contraction of “platinum” and “reformate” (reformate being the actual product of the process).
Shell failed to mention in its ads that all gasoline available at the time (and probably to this day, as well) contains Platformate. If you notice, the old commercials (which you can watch on YouTube) never mention that the other car’s gas tank contains a competitor’s gas without Platformate – only that the tank is filled with gas without Platformate. Which you couldn’t buy. Anywhere.
Thanks to Stickman’s link, my memory’s been jogged. Yes, I remember the stuff, but there were VERY FEW Shell stations that carried it in Mass/RI, and I don’t think it was available nationwide, just the northeast. Per the ad in Stickman’s link, the 91 octane cited was before the R+M/2 formula used today, and was the cheap stuff. I used 95 octane from Atlantic (later combined with Richfield to form Atlantic-Richfield Company=ARCO) in the late ’60’s in a 330 cid Olds, because the low 90’s stuff would make the engine ping. You’re not dreaming.
I worked at a Shell station in the 1970’s in California and never saw it. Note in that St. Pete Times ad linked above they talk about TCP. Similar to Platformate, TCP stands for Tri-Catalytic Process, used by all refiners, not just Shell. This Nitrogen thing is in the long tradition of Shell marketing hype. Chevron had “F-310” and TV ads with one car emitting smoke and the other clear exhaust.
Does anyone remember ARCO Graphite oil? I think it failed in the marketplace because it looked dirty right out of the can. Yes can, not bottle.
Stickman saves the day! I had no idea Google News did this!!!
Stickman, thanks for the link. I was really little back then, and I barely remembered it. But now I know I am not losing my mind. And no, texlovera, no subversive attempt attempted. I’m willing to bet that “binged” is not of my making…