Drive till out of gas

Why ?

 

welcome!

your car has a reserve, beyond dte = 0. i'm not sure about the c, but you can find it in the fuel tank capacity in the o/m.
just take miles driven and divide by average mpg, but be careful, the display is optimistic, compared to actual.
you may want to do a test run close to home, running it out of gas, and adding a gallon at a time, and trying to start it. prius requires a certain level of fuel before it will restart.
i'm not sure if constantly running the fuel pump dry will damage it, and when the engine shuts down, pull over and refuel, you don't want to run the hybrid battery too low, because you need it to restart the engine.

 

I'm going to resort to poetry:

No offense
But you're making no sense

Seriously, how does running the tank dry get you anything but grief. It forestalls getting your credit card out, but when you do you're spending more. Just fill up when you've still got a comfortable margin; concentrate on mpgs, not miles per tank.

 

I also believe that concentrating on miles per tank will likely greatly reduce your miles per vehicle lifetime.

 

Lump this behavior in with the folks who only "fill up" $5 or $10 at a time thinking they are saving money somehow.

 

I have recently discovered, completely by accident, how this could actually save money. I previously filled up my Prii when I had 2 or 3 dots left on the fuel gauge. I also always filled up at a gas station/convenience store 1 mile from my house. While my wife and I were on vacation several months ago, I filled up at a BP station. When I used my debit card, the pump screen asked if I wanted to save 50 cents a gallon by using 2000 points. ???? Had no idea what it was talking about but pressed yes. I received a 50 cent per gallon reduction on the fuel price, so it cost me $1.43 a gallon. I thought, gee, that was odd. Fast forward a few weeks. While we're out running errands, the gas gauge hit 2 dots and we were coming up on a BP station. Hmmmm. Let me try this again. Same exact thing. Come to find out, my credit union debit card has a reward program that builds points every time you use it. we use our debit card for everything!! I've had this account for 19 years. Those points provide a discount at BP stations. The bigger your fill-up, the more you save, so now I drive until one dot and fill up at the BP station most of the time. No real difference since it's about 3 miles from the house and I pass through that area every few days. It costs 2000 points whether I pump 1 gallon or a complete fill up. Hmmm....makes me wonder...I don't know if it has a max. I have (4) 5 gallon gas jugs and a dual tank F150 pick'em'up truck . Both tanks are under 1/4 full. I may check that max thing out today. That could be as much as 40-50 gallons. We currently have about 42,000 points available

 

Just think about what you are saying, please.

It makes ABSOLUTELY NO difference in fuel efficiency if you fill up at totally empty or half empty or only 1/4 empty.
NONE.

It is miles per gallon that counts, not miles per tank.....which is meaningless.

And running it completely out of gas can be very inconvenient, sometimes dangerous and totally pointless.

 

He could be trying for miles per $, not per gallon, and can get a better fuel price at that 450 mile distance. But he hasn't provided enough detail to let us know his reasons for that particular range.

In past threads I've given my specific reasons for wanting a 400 mile fuel range. My first car was far short of that, the next required nearly ideal conditions to achieve it. Elements of that desired range included long highway segments without fuel service, non-competitive pricing at isolated stations, closed stations on certain holiday weekends (especially at night), serious price gouging by a certain station taking advantage of their holiday monopoly, and 'free' fuel at one end (i.e. dad's treat, also with a reserve agricultural supply that could serve as a short term buffer in case of a repeat of certain geopolitical disruptions of the 1970s).

 

Don't go insane just because you got a Prius! It's just a car.

When it gets down to 1/4 tank remaining, fill it up! And just drive it.

 

Some people think just getting a Prius qualifies you as insane.

 

Reason #492 for having a better idea about your vehicle's fuel gauge and fuel range:

I spent last week as a support driver for a week long bicycling event. A couple days ago, after dropping off a rider and disabled bike at the next overnight camp, one driver was down to 1/4 tank, so elected to fill up before returning to the course for rider support. This was along a 74 mile stretch with no services, so fuel as either 14 miles ahead, or 60 miles and two mountain passes behind. Of course, he went forward.

But a few miles ahead, the road was completely closed by emergency crews, for one of those tragic incidents that takes hours to clear. (Fortunately, our cyclists were not passing that way until the next day.) So he returned to camp and quit for the day, having no confidence in being able to reach the station behind. And since we were down to the last couple hours for the day, he couldn't have returned from there in time to be useful.

At the driver meeting that evening, I commented that 1/4 tank means I have 200 miles left, so could very comfortably keep working the course and checking up on cyclists the rest of the day. And maybe tomorrow too. They all laughed, "that's because it's a Prius".

 

don't let these naysayers dissuade you derek!

 

fuel weight when empty might increase it?

 

As a brother and father to 2 master technicians... They will tell you that running your car that low on fuel will indeed damage your fuel pump as it utilizes the fuel itself to keep the pump cool. It'll work for a good while, but will eventually damage it if you continually run it low on fuel.

 

was this thread a set up to make me look stupid? i don't need any help with that.

 

There's a bit of truth in that, but not enough to risk running out of gas, IMHO.

It's a difference in mindset. As a pilot who once owned a small aircraft, I consider running out of gas to be an unforgivable cardinal sin, and can't truly understand why anyone else would want to risk it - even if it's "just" in a car that can pull over to the side of the road. However each person gets to live life as they choose, so if you wish to risk running out of gas that's entirely up to you. You're just not allowed to complain about it, as I've seen some people do. "I could only drive 40 miles with the last bar on the gauge blinking and it didn't give my any other warning!!!". Yeesh.

 

I can sort of confirm that. . My household's Honda and Acura, both of which frequently were intentionally run low on fuel, both suffered fuel pump failures.

But the good news was, both those replacements happened at about age 20 years. On all other brands of car we have had, we had to replace the entire car before that. So I'm not overly worried about mere fuel pumps.

(This doesn't apply to my Toyotas, which have not yet been keep much past age 5.)

 

Exactly what i heard from technical people. Better filled up and go.

 

I guess I'll continue the real world experiment then. I always go 50 miles after the light starts flashing. Haven't run out yet... and haven't had to replace my fuel pump yet... 85k miles and going... oh to make everyone cringe even more, I fill up past the second click too. Guess I should probably have had to replace my charcoal canister by now.