Combination meter: reputable place to purchase one new or used

What sort of issues are you having with the fuel gauge?

 

How do you know it’s 3/4 full? How many miles do you get on what you think is a full tank?

 

could be the level sensor in the tank, or the bladder acting up

 

Toyota Bulletin Fuel Tank and Fuel Gauge Diagnostic Tips

 

So we don’t yet know if you are actually low on fuel because of a stiff bladder problem or just errant fuel gauge and still have another couple hundred miles of fuel in tank. 35mpg is also a problem, pretty low.

 

It’s very easy to maximize mpg on Prius if one wants to. There are many obvious and subtle techniques like ‘pulse and glide’ and using cruise control whenever possible. Just Google hypermiling on Prius for tips. Even when people don’t give a $hit and floor the thing at every opportunity the mpg is pretty good.

 

35 is low to you driving in your area. My wife who refuses to change her driving style was getting 32mpg driving in Pittsburgh Pa. I could get behind the wheel driving the exact same route and same conditions and get 42 plus.

Since joining have seen alot of "something is wrong with your car because I get XX mpg" replies. Tracking your personal mpg and noticing a drop will be a sign of an issue. Not getting the same milage in Mt Storm, WVa as a driver in Richmond, Va or Kansas City, Mo however is not a sign of an issue in and of its self.

I have upgraded to a project lithium and I will tend to get 4 more mpg doing door dash in the south side of my city as apposed to delivery shifts in the north. It's not because there is an issue with my car or my driving but the topography.

 

Why should she change if there is no penalty?

 

The capacitors on the combination meter are part of the power supply circuit. They don't have anything to do with the fuel gauge or calibration.

The calibration that your talking about is the inclination sensor zeroing procedure. There are two incline sensors in the dash that detect if the vehicle is on a non level surface. There's a left/right sensor and a forward/rear sensor. All these do is ensure that the gauge doesn't take any wild swings just because you're on a hill. This calibration can't be lost because it's written into a memory chip on the board. It can only be replaced with new calibration data if you perform the procedure again.

Because of the Gen 2 Prius gas tank design it's very common to start getting low level readings from the sending unit (in the tank) when it's still more than half full. I suspect that it's due to the rubber bladder failing to expand and contract as easily as when it was new. The more you short cycle the tank the worse the problem gets. By short cycling I mean filling up way before the tank is actually empty (even if the gauge says empty).

Here's what I tell all of our customers and it works almost every time.

-Fill the car all the way up with gas and make sure that the mileage tracker on the consumption screen resets to 0.

-Drive a minimum of 350 miles before filling up again. Even if the fuel gauge says empty after 150 miles do not fill it up until you get to 350 miles .

-The tank holds 12 gallons so even if you're only averaging 35 mpg you should be able to go 420 miles before it runs out of gas.

-Remember - the solution to the problem is getting the tank as close to empty before filling it up. Ideally your fill ups will be 9.5 to 10 gallons.

-If you find that after 350 miles the car is only taking 8 gallons then extend your next tank to 375 miles, ect., ect.

-Basically you keep stepping your range up until find the sweet spot where you're adding around 10 gallons every time you fill up.

-If you do this you will find that after 5-6 fill ups (sometime much sooner) the sending unit in the tank will start reading more accurately and the blocks on the fuel gauge will tick off more evenly instead of going from full to empty in very short time.

Hope this helps,
Matt
TX Hybrid

 

and carry a 3+ gallon safety can with a nozzle able to go through the check door.