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Petrol Guage roulette - Who Plays this?


maddog1982

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Anyone else ran there car until the DTE is just lines?! I was 3 junctions from home when it hit 15 miles to empty and then it jumped to - - - - and the needle on the gauge all the way round under the red! About a mile later the fear set in as the motorway went to a single lane!! I usually always put in around the 1/4 mark but with helping my friend move on Saturday and having a date I didn't have time before I picked her up! Turns out after driving the car for a good 5 miles on the lines I could just get 71 litres in her so a good two gallons left anyway. Any one managed more than 71 litres?

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Nope, only time this has ever happened was the day I picked the car up from buying it. windows were all frosted up too but I didn't have any fuel to wait for it, had to wipe myself a small port-hole and drive a totally "foreign" car to the petrol station which thankfully was only a mile away. (then the fun ensued when I had to figure out how to open then petrol cap...)

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Nope, only time this has ever happened was the day I picked the car up from buying it. windows were all frosted up too but I didn't have any fuel to wait for it, had to wipe myself a small port-hole and drive a totally "foreign" car to the petrol station which thankfully was only a mile away. (then the fun ensued when I had to figure out how to open then petrol cap...)

 

When I bought my Zed a few years back the guy had no fuel in it at all, sitting on the needle on red. I drove it off with sat nav searching for the nearest petrol garage and just hoped. I had 19L in my VX when I sold it at the weekend!

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always play petrol gauge roulette - mainly because i know the gauge is rubbish.

 

quite happy doing 40-50 miles on the dashes if the mpg readout for the tank is good - very rarely need to fill up before 400 miles.

 

if i do fill up when the dte says empty, i only fit 60 litres in!

 

also, my car frequently panics about petrol just after i start driving - about 5 minutes into a drive it will panic and give me a range of 20 miles, but then 10 miles later it finds some more petrol and dte goes back up to 60 :wacko:

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I've played it a few times, using the computers MPG and the trip to calculate how much fuel I have. The Zeds gauge is notorious for reading wrong and even calculating it then adding what I put in comes to less than the full 80 liters, so I assume the MPG reads a little lower than it should also. Not a bad thing.

 

I did "run out" of petrol once playing this game and ha to coast into a lay-by and call for help :lol: My brother arrived with a 5 liter can and the car started flawlessly once it was in, making me think it wasn't actually empty. I then drove about 3 miles to the nearest BP and only got about 70 liters in, meaning there was still 5 in there when it ran out.

 

My only guess is, it wasn't actually empty, but the petrol is a little dodgy down that low. I'll not be running it that close again incase some crap gets into the engine and causes problems… :scare:

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I used to do this all the time. I think the most stressful time i did it was when I had a brand spanking new 370z Roadster as a courtesy car from Nissan. I had to take it back, and my "miles to empty" was saying 50 miles and the Sat Nav reckoned it was 60 miles. I remember driving it like a vicar and praying i didnt get stuck in traffic. The miles to empty ended up flashing the - - - and the sat nav still reckoned 15 miles left to go. I remember I just managed to make it before the car started spluttering onto the dealers forecourt.

 

For the sake of putting £5 of fuel in, it wasnt really worth the stress.

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Is it poss to get the DTE light to go out again ?? so your thundering along, DTE comes on, slow down drive like a vicar, would it go out again if DTE in theory goes up ??

 

Something to play with on the way home tonight methinks

 

DTE comes on at 40 miles I think, so yes, it's possible to drive more economical and stop the light. Well, I say light, the one by the gauge won't change, just the trip computer one.

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I used to do this all the time. I think the most stressful time i did it was when I had a brand spanking new 370z Roadster as a courtesy car from Nissan. I had to take it back, and my "miles to empty" was saying 50 miles and the Sat Nav reckoned it was 60 miles. I remember driving it like a vicar and praying i didnt get stuck in traffic. The miles to empty ended up flashing the - - - and the sat nav still reckoned 15 miles left to go. I remember I just managed to make it before the car started spluttering onto the dealers forecourt.

 

For the sake of putting £5 of fuel in, it wasnt really worth the stress.

 

Similar thing happened when we picked up our first 370 - dealer told us there was easily enough fuel to get us home, but the dreaded lines appeared when we were stuck in a jam on the motorway! Eventually made it to a petrol station but very unnerving for a first drive in what was a very unfamiliar car :wacko:

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When my gauge says empty and the light comes on I still can hardly put more than 55-60 litres in. I don't risking though, having run out of fuel on a motorbike a while back I'm the Middle of nowhere I vowed never to do it again!

 

Nearly did this on my R1. Decided that the fuel at the garage was too expensive so id go to the next one, only to find the next one was closed down. Ended up poodling along at about 30mph for what seeemed for ever until i found the next garage only to find out it was 5p a litre more expensive than the original garage. Doh. Funny thing was id only have saved hardly anything when you worked out the bike could only take £15 or something of fuel anyway.

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When the lines goes -- doesn't it still have 10 litres remaining? Its an EU safety thing.

 

You could only get 71 litres in so still had 9 litres in the tank (in theory).

 

from my experience - typically fill up with just over 50 miles left - takes 60 litres back to the top

 

...so 20 litres left in tank

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Is it poss to get the DTE light to go out again ?? so your thundering along, DTE comes on, slow down drive like a vicar, would it go out again if DTE in theory goes up ??

 

Something to play with on the way home tonight methinks

 

Yep, mine's done it a few times now. The light will invariably come on just as I pull onto my drive (rather than when I'm approaching the petrol station), it'll still be on next time I start the car (obviously) but 5 minutes of sensible driving later it decides it's found some more petrol in the tank, the light does out and the DTE goes up. Usually come back on again at some point though, unfortunately I occasionally have to put more petrol in to get the light to go out...

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Glad it's not just me who got it from the garage with fumes in the tank, was lucky it was only 5 mins to a Tesco. Just this morning ,my lights lit up like Homer Simpson's workstation, then by the time I cruised to work the crisis had been avoided.

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thanks to my terrible OCD i have to fill up at just over 1/4 tank. If my fuel light came on i'd drive straight into a tree. Generally only get £60 in so just over half the tank. Still dont dare go under 1/4 though.

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Is it poss to get the DTE light to go out again ?? so your thundering along, DTE comes on, slow down drive like a vicar, would it go out again if DTE in theory goes up ??

 

 

 

I've never seen the light go off and once the DTE starts reading ---- then it stays there while the car is in motion, however if you drive slowly for a few miles, stop the car and turn the engine off then on restarting the light will often stay off (for a couple of miles) and the DTE can register a few miles left, I've seen as many as 15 miles. I've also seen mine drop from 22 to ---- within a mile on a shallow hill at 50 mph.

 

Pete

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You can get the light to go off, if you drive more economically.

 

Also the fuel gauge doesn't seem to measure what the tank level is, it just shows a level relating to the readout on the dte.

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