Let's post the relationship to your needle getting close to empty and how many gallons it took to fill up so we know how much farther we can go in a jam. The book says that when the light comes on you are supposed to have 2 gallons of gas left.

Today my light came on 15miles from my destination. I have to drive back 20 miles. So based on that I had 11.5 gallons left in the tank. I had to go 35 miles. Based on that I used .807 gallons before I filled up. My gauge said I was on the red just above it but on the red. So I was worried. I feather footed it to the gas station and was surprised that I had 1.2 gallons left. That is cutting it pretty close.

If you are on a long trip and the light comes on, it is nice to know how much further you can go before panic.

Regards
Jib01

 

I have driven til the low fuel alert comes on 3 different times
now and the results have been close to the same each time.
I fill at the same Shell,same pump and it takes 44 liters to first
click off of the pump,indicating I have about 7.1 liters left
or 1.9 gallons US.
I normally get about 27 mpg US in the city so I would feel
safe with a 30-40 mile gas search.

 

 

The manual is accurate when it states there is 2 gallons left when the chime rings. I've driven just short of 2 score miles on E & filled up with 12.9 gallons.

My Ford Festiva's MPG & gasgauge were v. consistent & the car would travel 70 flat highway miles while on E.Years ago in Wyoming,I'd traveled 20+miles on E & the map said the next town was 30+miles away. When I gassed up in the next town, I had gone 524miles on 9.77 gallons with a 10 gallon tank. I could have driven another 11+miles. The only thing that made me nervous...I banked on the car getting 53+MPG which it did.

 

[:-] You guys like to live dangerously!!! I never let the gauge go lower than about 1/8 tank, crossing my fingers hoping there is enough gas left to reach the next gas station!

While on long trips when the needle is getting close to the 1/4 tank mark I always stop at the next station to fill-up, especially during the cold season. Getting stuck with no gas when it's below freezing point is definitely not a pleasant experience!!!

 

While you may think it's living dangerously I have only let
it go to the low fuel warning while driving in the city and
then again I have roadside service to 100,000 km and
I own a cellphone plus hamradio in car for emergencies.
Not that brave just prepared!

 

Unfortunately the fuel id-ten-t light isn't reliable and your mileage does vary. You could have anywhere from a halfa gallon to a quarter tankleft. Best way to find out how it works is to take a large gas can and put it in your cargo area just in case and test how far you can go with the vehicle as when the light comes on or drive to a nearby fuel station immediately after it comes on and see how much it takes to top off the tank. Motorcyclists also test what their reserve capacity is by having someone with a gas can follow them and running the primary dry and switching to reserve to see how far they can go.

Retest it if you have the fuel sending unit replaced after a few fill ups or computer work done on any vehicle.

On my 1995 Dakota (on it's third fuel sending unit since I've owned it), the need fuel id-ten-t light comes on at just below a quarter tank now. When At least that's when it came on when I was driving back from Idaho a couple of weeks ago. It came on about 17 ormiles from northern Odgen. I had close to four gallons left when I fueled at the Maverik station in northern Ogden.When Ioriginally got the truck back in fall 1997 it came on just above E. A great variance with the same vehicle after the fuel sending unit was replaced twice.

I also had to foresight to have a full five gallon gas can with me in the bed of the truck just in case as it was below freezing in the teens during the drive up and around freezing the drive back (upper 20's and very low 30's). If you live in an environment where it gets cold enough to where it can be lethal, you should have a spare full gas can cargo area of your vehicle during the colder months just in case to keep the engine running and yourself and passengers warm until help arrives.

As a rule of thumb, I avoid letting the fuel gauge go below half in any vehicle I use. This is an especially good practice if you live in an area where you may have to evacuate because of mother nature (i.e. hurricanes) or drive long distances where there's considerable distances between fuel stops.

 

StepOnit & Netentity....Man, you get scared easily don't you. Anyhow, I'd rather just have a reliable car instead of worrying about filling the gas tank when it is half full. Driving around with an average 36 pounds of gas more & stopping to gas up twice as often asme is crazy.

For 400,000 miles my cars have given MPG under different conditions that I understood & understood the MPG I was going to get. If you'resometimessurprised when you car gets better or worseMPG than you expected, you must learn to read your travel conditions better.

Have someone followyour motorcyclewith gasoline!? You should have carried your own quart of gas.A quart of gas would havesent me 18 miles down the road.My cycle only carried 3.7 gallons.Sometimes I'd travel 250 miles & I never ran out of gas. & lots of times I must have had only2 tenths of a gallon left. But I knew I could go 15 miles more. Just know your machine.

The only time Icarried extra gallons ofgas was when I'd go into another state's wilderness areathat had considerably higher gas prices than my state. I'd go 325+ miles into that state to my destination & then return tofill in my own state. Its wonderful whenI have a high MPG car & go800+ miles onthe car's tank+an extra7 gallons.

Carry an extra 5 gallonsto keep you warm if you get standed? Once I locked my keysin my car with the engine running. Took an hour before I got extra keys to unlock the car. After gassing up, I got 43 MPG on a car that normally got 44MPG. I could idle for days before even needing the extra 5 gallons & then could idle for another day or more. Yousure do find excuses to carry weight around with you. But most Americans do too,so you're not any different.

 

I conduct my life under the following premise, "What's the worst that can happen and what can I do to fix it now?"

With respect to being stuck in cold weather you can carry extra fuel (to keep warm until help arrives in cold weather if you can run the engine), water, a good spare tire and a serpentine belt (with tools to change it) and tape to seal cooling system hose leaks.

It's not an issue that my truck isn't reliable. It actually handled the trip from Vegas to Idaho just before Xmas quite well. A few legs of the trip outside of the snow and ice areas going south back to Vegas I got it up to almost a hundred tearing up the road. Most of the time I was well behaved and kept it below 85 in the rural areas.

I also have a very good mechanic take care of my vehicles. He's part owner of a local shop, lead body tech at a local dealer and has worked as a member of a pit crew for NASCAR for many years. I couldn't ask for anyone better to take care of my vehicles.

With any vehicle, high mileage or not, there's always the Murphy's law factor. Being prepared mitigates that factor to some degree.

 

Really I think the whole point of the original post was "how accurate is the
low fuel indicator".
I inherently test it on all new cars I have bought since feature was
introduced just to know what the limitations or variables were
in case I was foolish enough to get in the situation of finding fuel.