Western Railroad Discussion > Gasoline at $3.35 and going up

As everyone knows, one of our critical elements of foaming is gasoline. I just walked by the Circle-K here in Monterey (usually the cheapest) and they are up to $3.35. A roundtrip to Dunsmuir with the U.S.S. Explorer will cost $120.35. I can't imagine what it would be for the captains of the U.S.S. Ram or U.S.S. Expedition right now! No more foaming trips outside a 120 mile radius for me.

Sam Reeves
—
http://www.samreevesphoto.com

Forget the Ram unless its diesel. My V8 quad cad 4x4 Dakota only gets 12 mpg so the Ram should be about 2-3 mpg less. Gas hasn't hit me too hard yet but I can telecommute all week and use the saved money to fan on the weekends.

How bout the RV crowd? Some of them are getting less than 10MPG.
Takes the R out of RV when Your at the pump.

Today in Greenville,CA

$3.59 unleaded

RailFan radius just keeps shrinking..........

DaveL

Sam, you'll have docking fees with those things too, tugs aren't cheap. Many of those things get 5 mpg, loaded or empty. Keep in mind there are places that charge less for gas, just have to find them. Sure cuts down on the photo-lines though.


samreeves Wrote:
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A roundtrip to Dunsmuir
> with the U.S.S. Explorer will cost $120.35. I
> can't imagine what it would be for the captains of
> the U.S.S. Ram or U.S.S. Expedition right now!

Just have to pick and choose your chases very wisely. Bring a friend and split the gas if you can.

TME

West Central Missouri--$2.68

samreeves Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> As everyone knows, one of our critical elements of
> foaming is gasoline. I just walked by the
> Circle-K here in Monterey (usually the cheapest)
> and they are up to $3.35. A roundtrip to Dunsmuir
> with the U.S.S. Explorer will cost $120.35. I
> can't imagine what it would be for the captains of
> the U.S.S. Ram or U.S.S. Expedition right now! No
> more foaming trips outside a 120 mile radius for
> me.
>
> Sam Reeves
> —
>
Sam,
It's getting totally out of control!!! It now costs a small fortune to travel to Dunsmuir, Tehachapi and Donner to name a few. Car pooling to railfan may soon become reality.

Kent in Carmel Valley

This weekend is when the new gasoline standards take effect. Also, this is the weekend when summer blends have to be available and winter blends are not legal for sale. Every year, there's a lot of volatility in the gasoline markets during the week of the changeover.

As to the new standards. the refiners have been trying to clear out the old stuff (known as RFG, with MTBE) to make room for the new (known as RBOB, with ethanol). Crude oil price has been roughly stable for the last ten days or so, so changes at the pump more likely relate to issues with the mandatory changeover. Figure another week and things'll calm down----but for you in California, that might still mean $3.10 a gallon versus the quotes cited earlier of $3.35-$3.60. Not so bad here in Ohio, where gas is still $2.80ish this morning.

BobE

You may even like it. They were all over Italy last summer...
A nice red one with Camera saddlebags...Perfect

BobE Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
the refiners have been
> trying to clear out the old stuff (known as RFG,
> with MTBE) to make room for the new (known as
> RBOB, with ethanol).
> BobE


Actually heard this discussion represented while in LA a couple of weeks ago, some of the stations were letting the tanks drain and then shut down for a few days. Part of the story was about not enough delivery trucks, another subject was the station owners were making more profit on a candy bar than on a gallon of gas. KNX radio does a relatively great job.
Another story told of a station owner who refused to sell any gas, claiming profit issues, the parent company pulled the lease, or whatever, and shut them down. Rough business.
Mid-grade $3.35 in Mountain View, $3.80 or so in Menlo Pork/Atherton.

I expanded my radius by trading in my 2500HD Silverado (6.0 gas sucking engine) for a Pontiac Vibe (just like a Toyota Matrix, but with Pontiac emblems).

Basically, I can go twice as far on half as much fuel. Much different than a four door crew cab truck, especially in the ground clearance dept. I got the Vibe stuck (high centered) on the berm of a graded road out of Ludlow. My Silverado wouldn't have even grimaced at suck a berm... Oh well, at least the Vibe drives past the gas stations without a flinch !!

-al likes driving

(photo compliments of VegasRails, who drug me off the berm with his Silverado, THANKS KEN !!)

---

TCnR Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> BobE Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> the refiners have been
> > trying to clear out the old stuff (known as
> RFG,
> > with MTBE) to make room for the new (known as
> > RBOB, with ethanol).
> > BobE
>
>
> Actually heard this discussion represented while
> in LA a couple of weeks ago, some of the stations
> were letting the tanks drain and then shut down
> for a few days. Part of the story was about not
> enough delivery trucks, another subject was the
> station owners were making more profit on a candy
> bar than on a gallon of gas. KNX radio does a
> relatively great job.
> Another story told of a station owner who refused
> to sell any gas, claiming profit issues, the
> parent company pulled the lease, or whatever, and
> shut them down. Rough business.



The average profit margin for a service station is 8-10 cents per gallon.....I used to follow the stock of Casey's General Stores, which has gas pumps but not refineries, so it was easy to find out this info. You can figure candy bars are 25%-50% of the purchase price, so a lot higher.

One of the issues with these small gas stations is how they get their gas. With a company-owned station or a major franchise, they'll have a contract that gets them priority delivery. The little country station or independent has to call around and buy excess tankers...literally the gas left over after the contracts are satisfied. If there's none left over, well, they're screwed. If the prices they're quoted are off the charts, they're screwed. Yes, rough business.

True story, which I'll tell while waiting for my wife to come downtown to pick me up (my Tahoe is in the shop today...15 mpg, BTW....so I own a bunch of oil stocks...). I worked in a Gulf station while in college. Friday and Saturday nights 11 p.m. - 7 a.m. Took the job when gas was 65 cents a gallon. Three weeks later, the Shah of Iran fled and the Ayatollah Khomeini took over and took our people hostage.....gas was selling for $1.40.

BobE

I can see a stack train in the background! Hopefully getting stuck didn't distract you from the photo business at hand.

If you were to buy a dedicated Natural Gas Honda Civic. Yes, natural gas that you use in your cooking stove. Then buy the slow fill home kit that picks up Natural Gas and slowly fills the tank to 3600 PSI while you sleep at night. You pay about 5 cents a Therm which is about equivalent to a gallon of gasoline.
The down side is the slow fill kit is about $3000 bucks and your limited were you can buy Natural Gas away from home. Hmmm I wonder why?
Could it by the big oil Lobbyists in DC?

PS> Natural gas has 137 octane.

Dave

I just recalaculated the fuel needs for the Ultimate Railfan Adventure, based on averages of the fuel prices of all the areas we will travel through on our 4200 mile jaunt.

With the fuel economy that the 31' long Beast gets, we're looking at around $2000+ just in gas.

Z

http://www.phoenixpartners.net/URA

It's time to get into an altruistic mode and consider saving a little fossil fuel for our great-grandchildren by not using fuel-inefficient personal land barges to chase and photograph fuel-efficient freight trains. Buy some RR calendars instead.

First off I'm 15 years old-- gas prices aren't an issue (for now).

Second, I live less than threem iles away from a mainline, so riding a bike is my transport of choice.

>>MC>> why don't others do this where and whenever possible?

lurchdel Wrote:
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> It's time to get into an altruistic mode and
> consider saving a little fossil fuel for our
> great-grandchildren ...

What would they do with it?

Maybe we'll have this part figured out by then. I'm still waiting for my Jetson's flying car.

Gas here in Central FL this morning... $2.85 a gal. I don't do much railfanning anymore since I moved next to the CSX main line here in Central FL. I can step out my front door and see trains to my hearts content. Lots of foreign power through here, mostly UP and BNSF with a sprinkling of NS,KCS,CP/Soo and CN. Approximately 16-20 movements a day. I am about 30 ft from the tracks...

JRF