On my recent road trip I made the stressful discovery that it is possible to drive pretty far with the low gas warning light on and the gauge showing below empty.
I'm not one to "push the limits" on items like this, but looking at my route on the map I was certain there would be many opportunities to fill up along the way. I started looking for gas stations when I had about 1/3 of a tank left. We ended up on 70 West between Fruita and Crescent Junction. The stress started setting in when I saw a sign that said "no services next 40 miles" and my low fuel light was already on!
I turned off the AC and drove about 70 MPH instead of the posted speed limit of 80. There was quite a bit of uphill driving along the way. The needle was pretty far below empty when I finally pulled into the first available gas station in Thompson 40 miles later, so I was really curious how many gallons it would take to fill the tank.
The verdict was 23.3 gallons. Since the tank holds 25.4 gallons, I still had a small margin of range left after driving for about 30 minutes with the needle on or below empty.
Moral of the story:
1) I'm going to carry extra gas on these trips from now on.
2) It's easy to compound bad decisions. I should have pulled over and studied if it made more sense to backtrack for gas than to proceed.
I'm not one to "push the limits" on items like this, but looking at my route on the map I was certain there would be many opportunities to fill up along the way. I started looking for gas stations when I had about 1/3 of a tank left. We ended up on 70 West between Fruita and Crescent Junction. The stress started setting in when I saw a sign that said "no services next 40 miles" and my low fuel light was already on!
I turned off the AC and drove about 70 MPH instead of the posted speed limit of 80. There was quite a bit of uphill driving along the way. The needle was pretty far below empty when I finally pulled into the first available gas station in Thompson 40 miles later, so I was really curious how many gallons it would take to fill the tank.
The verdict was 23.3 gallons. Since the tank holds 25.4 gallons, I still had a small margin of range left after driving for about 30 minutes with the needle on or below empty.
Moral of the story:
1) I'm going to carry extra gas on these trips from now on.
2) It's easy to compound bad decisions. I should have pulled over and studied if it made more sense to backtrack for gas than to proceed.