2011 Prius ran out of gas

I don't defend those who unexpectedly and repeatedly run out of fuel.

But plenty of others express definitions of 'fumes' that cover 30% to 50% of the potential driving range of the (very pessimistically gauged) car I most recently sold, and throw in plenty of FUD about using that range. A significant number of them would be hurriedly looking for fuel while it still had 65% of its range remaining.

Sorry, but I refuse to throw that much of a vehicle's potential range into a fuzzy, uncertain, scary bin of 'might or might not be there', untested except in an emergency. The commercial aircraft industry seems to know its fuel range to an uncertainty of something under 10 minutes, carrying a fuel safety margin for one alternate landing site plus 30-45 minutes. Why should I put up with 2 hours of range uncertainty?

Bob is willing to go down to the last 0.5 gallon. I'll go down to the last 1 gallon in benign conditions, keeping considerably more margin when weather or schedule or significant other risks are present. [ Jimbo's Gen2 refueling ditty of "With mother-in-law in the car, refill at 3 bars. With just spouse in car, refill at 2 bars. ..." is quite appropriate for that particular model. ] And I require very benign, low-risk conditions for the first forays into the lower tank portion of any new-to-me car.

Some folks don't want the 'aggravation' of worrying about fuel levels that low, and apparently don't want anyone else to do so either. But I don't want to pay premium fuel prices just for the privilege of not having to think or plan. In fact, I rather enjoy exercising some of those accounting- and engineering-minded brain cells. So when traveling, I'll check the route ahead on gasbuddy.com, and opportunistically plan refills for anywhere between 30% and 90% of fuel range.

BTW, I've unexpectedly run out of fuel only once in my life -- on the first tank of the very first car I actually owned, with the gauge still above 'E'. (The backstory: it happened shortly after my parents switched cars as I stepped out the door for an important date, assured me that the newly assigned car had 'plenty of gas', and when I complained the next day about it being below 'E', they ribbed me for days while continuing to push it deeper. I had previously made sure the originally intended car was fully prepped / cleaned / fueled.) The few subsequent dry tanks since were planned, useful (though I didn't collect as much engineering data as Bob has), and quite uneventful.

 

So what was the verdict? curious to know...

 

disconnecting the battery negative for a minute should have worked.

 

Roughly two years elapsed between post #10 and the thread's revival with post #11.

The original post and an identical one to another sub forum are the only two mel82pem ever posted to Priuschat.

 

I guess I'm glad to hear that I'm not the only one who has run our of gas. There were apparently no consequences to my little mishap because I've put another 100K on her and she's still going strong

XT1254 ?

 

My wife managed to run out of gas after driving my Prius several days straight. She never noticed the low gas indicator (it is rather nondescript). To add salt to the wounds, it happened on the Mass Pike just after driving by a service station. Furthermore, I was in the middle of an oil change on our other car so I couldn't hop in that. So I had to take my son's car, a 2006 Prius. I grabbed the 5 gallon gas can and filled it up. Then off to the rescue. I poured about 4 gallons into the car, scared for my life while pouring the gas with those 18 wheelers whizzing by. I didn't want to pour it all in fearing that potential sediment getting in the tank. My wife hit the start button, the gas gauge read 2 bars. Fortunately the car started up no problem. That was 6 months ago. Since that time, experienced no problems or side effects. Hopefully this incident will not happen again. Now I text my wife a reminder to check the gas gauge when she has the car and I think the gas level is low.