Ya know Rob, you're getting to be almost as much of a trouble maker as Brisco!!

To completely deal with the octane thing would probably take another one of those two part posts (each post is limited to 10,000 characters). You snuck in the RON on your 98 there, which is a term not often used in this country. It stands for Research Octane Number, and is a meaningful qualifier, but only if understood by the reader. Which in this country is not very common. We have a rating number on our pumps that is an average of two rating methods, the Research number as above, and what's referred to as Motor Octane Number (MON). If you were to look at the sticker on a pump here there would be a formula in tiny print at the bottom that shows R + M/2. Meaning, Research Octane Number plus Motor Octane Number divided by 2 = the average of the two tests. The RON and MON are two tests run on the same sample of fuel, the MON being the more severe and yeilding a smaller number. The typical spread between the two is 8-10. So a 93 rated fuel at our pumps would be a 97-98 RON fuel. We had a lot of understanding issues, particularly in the mid '70's to early '80's, because the vehicle manufacturers were using the engineering approach in their owner manuals and specifying the RON level numbers, but the stations were required by Federal law to post the R+M/2, which, as you can see, is a lower number. Poor consumers were going nuts, at least the few that read the manual, and of course the oil companies were blamed. (Government dodged the bullet again). In time the manufacturers revised their manuals bringing peace and harmony across the land!

Your 98 RON is way more octane than the 8.6 to 1 that Richard calculated requires. You probably wouldn't have any ping with a 93 RON fuel, or whatever your "Regular" grade is. As for your lead question, no, all our "street" fuels are unleaded now. A few brands of racing gasoline still have lead, but there are also unleaded, high octane, racing gasolines out there. In most cases the engine doesn't care if there's lead in there or not. Many folks here, and perhaps there, fear exhaust valve recession (if they're rational), and some fear total annilation of their engine (if they're irrational) if they use unleaded fuel. While exhaust valve recession is a POSSIBILITY with the use of pre-'72 cylinder heads (this country, I don't know about yours), it usually only occurs in severe use e.g. racing, trailer towing, or any other regime that causes high, sustained, cylinder head temps.

And BTW, I don't wear a watch, so just send the money!