Truth or myth?

After the first click-off I just round it up to the next whole dollar. At today’s price for a gallon of gas, that’s way less than a quart of gas. That’s not going to damage anything.

 

That makes a lot more sense. I've heard many say they do the same...

 

I was thinking it’s funny because when I fill my boat up a 23 gallon tank you have to be so careful and “listen” for it getting full. I can’t tell you how many times I stop, look down in filler neck. If you don’t and you wait for the click you have gas coming out of the side vent and onto the ground (18ft boat on trailer)

I have often wondered why they can make a boat full up similar to a car but I suppose that would be one more thing to worry about. Maybe it’s different also since you have to fill from the top some as opposed to on the side.

 

I must be the gas pumping nightmare for everyone here then.

I run a tank down to below E every single time. In fact, my commuter Civic, I deliberately ran out of gas to determine exactly what my range is and now I fill up like 10 miles shy of that range. Range is 40 miles after the '0 miles remaining' comes on for that. On the 4R I fill up after the "miles to empty" has been on "1" for about 15 miles. I operate the motorcycles similarly, running them right to the end of their range.

The main reason I do that in the Civic is because time is a valuable commodity when commuting for 70 minutes one way, and if I can manage to fill up once every 5 days it economizes time versus filling up once every 4 days. On the other vehicles I just take a certain pride in going as far as humanely possible on a tank.

So...

By necessity of doing that, I want as much gas as possible in the tank / neck so I regularly give it probably 3-5 pumps after it clicks. I have in the past spooged gas down the side after too many clicks and I will again.

I've been filling like this as long as I've driven a car... So since 1993...

And I've never - never - had an issue... Not with fuel pump failure, not with lines rupturing, nothing.

I say myth, but the posts opposing that are many.

 

Wow the only thing I purposely run out of gas is my lawn mower in fall and snowblower in spring

Now with products like tru fuel I don’t even need to but still do out of habit for storage.

 

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even with a short commute, I try to stay away from the gas station, because your right, time is money.

 

Just bought a Toyota Certified used (rental return) 2022 4Runner. Every time I fill the tank and allow the pump to auto shut off, an ounce or so gas squirts out the filler neck and drips down the side of the fender.
Upon close inspection of the issue I now see that rust has formed on the horizontal seam of the fender, presumably from the gas that sat in the seam over the past year and a half. Being a rental, I can only imagine how many times people tried to overfill the tank. I am taking it in to the dealer this week. Really hoping the issue is covered by warranty.

 

I never put gas in my 4Runner. If I start it up I have to shut it off right away and change the oil... twice...

 

Yea don't overfill it.

I learned this the hard way. Topped off right before going into Cibola National Forest for some wheeling and camping.
No check engine light but the extra fuel definitely filled the EVAP system and started causing issues. Smelled like a gas leak to the point I stopped and looked everywhere for the leak... I was even considering maybe a natural gas leak nearby, but I didn't recall any natural gas pipelines in the maps I studied. It had the wife pretty worried.

Long story short it was the evap system filling up with the extra fuel. It can cause bigger issues if you do it a lot. I got lucky and got warned by the smell.

I know not to do that again.

 

I am guilty of this as I try to get to the next quarter or dollar depending on where it's at. I like round numbers.

 

I like round numbers too.

 

I would always fill and round up a dollar or two in my Acura TL. I even would fill and shake the car to get as much gas in there as passable for trips. Acura made it to 300,000mi and no fuel issues (CPU failed).

I never do this with my 4Runner, at most one extra click of a several cents of gas thanks to others advice here.

 

What is the point of overfilling? I can see maybe giving it one more squeeze if you thought the pump may have shut off before the tank was full. I've had this happen with pumps with a very high flow rate. But squeezing the handle multiple times to try to top off the tank can't get you more than a fraction of a gallon of additional fuel in the tank. Even if you don't look at the range after refuel screen in the multi-info display - the low fuel warning light comes on with ~3.5 gallons left in the tank. Assuming a conservative 15mpg - you got a little more than 50 miles before you run out of gas. How often is anyone more than 50 miles from a gas station? My point being - if you run your 4Runner out of gas you're going to run it out of gas whether you give those few extra squeezes at the gas pump, or not. When I first learned to drive at 16 my father told me - "you're going to probably eventually be in an accident, you're going to probably eventually get a speeding ticket" (he was correct on both) "try to be as safe as you can - but if something like that happens just come home and we'll deal with it". Then he said "just don't come home and tell me you ran out of gas - because, if you do, you're a god damned meathead". Must have sunk in. I've never, in my life, run out of gas in any vehicle I have ever driven in 43 years.

 

Gonna have to tell my son that one day.

I helped someone out recently who ran out of gas on a freeway on ramp. He passed by two gas stations on the way to the on ramp....
I stopped, gave him five gallons of premium, and told him to be safe out there. The guy had his entire family stuck on the side of the freeway.

Not gonna lie that blew my mind a little bit.

 

I agree with you as far as topping off...but some of us live where gas stations are few and far between so if there is an open service station we make sure the gas tank is full all the time.

 

Good point Yamahamer - I know you and all the other peeps out west deal with long distances between gas stations regularly. Heck, I do to occasionally - we make an annual trip to Colorado every year - and when you get into western Kansas/eastern Colorado - you better take advantage of filling up when you can. But you deal with it just as you describe - not by trying to overfill your gas tank and squeeze in an extra quart of gas. By the way - I know that is not the reason people over-fill their tanks. I don't think anyone trying to get that fifth squeeze of the gas pump in is really thinking "yeah that extra 6oz of gas I got in there will keep me from running out of gas". Its more like some type of mindset that requires them to try to optimize everything - except they are de-optimizing their fuel system.

 

I'd be topping off at each one.

 

Thanks for your encouragement. They replaced the fuel tank without a question. It took some haggling to get them to cover repainting the fender just below the fuel cap. Gas had run down the fender into the horizontal seam and bubbled the paint. They tried to say the issues were not related. Got that taken care of at no charge, too.