Ferrari Mailing List: Re: Car, watch, license plate & gas guide

[Paul Bennett (pbennett]

At 03:38 PM 3/8/2008 -0800, you wrote:
>Well, while you guys may only have 6 digit plates - you still get your gas 
>pumped for you.

While initially sold for fire safety, that gas pumping anti self service law is 
commonly
misunderstood.   It cost way far more to install and maintain the special card 
reading 
pumps with remote monitor for customer self service use than to have minimum 
wage bloks pump gas.

But you can't hire guys to pump gas anymore that last more than 2 weeks, can't 
bond 
illegals, so owners have been talked into paying big bucks for self-service 
type 
systems.  Owners soon find they must get a cage and pay double minimum wage 
and have difficulty hiring bondable reliable bloks for that job.  

Incidently, they way the law is written in Oregon, driver cannot place the hose 
in the car
or start the pump.  They may, however, turn the pump off and replace the hose.

Incidently, there were 6 gas distributors in Oregon and all got gas from the 
same 
pipe in Portland.  Truck driver would dump in a specialty mix for whichever 
gas brand he was delivering to to change.  That mix would change octane or
clean your plugs or whatever but it was all the same gas.  Those 6 guys, like a 
cartel,
also establish gas price for the state.  Which is why we never follow national 
trends. 
I said were as my source is now a couple years back and I've heard some brands 
like 
Arco were trying to break away.     My source is now working car washes and 
really
some good stories and big bucks there.