33 replies to this topic

[happydude2012]

youre right,

sat nav will do the trick (dont use a smart phone) - ill wait till im on "empty" and then start counting on the miles

[gazza82]

Fill it, drive and count the miles on something other than your wonky speedo, fill up and that will tell you your mpg ... and no chance of running out ...

[smurfomatic]

For a long term calculation, just keep a record of number of litres of fuel purchased and miles travelled, simple enough to put this in a spreadsheet and it'll give you a rolling average of mpg.

 

Mine has done an average of 40.5mpg over about 72,000 miles

[happydude2012]

maybe the sender is busted? 

[CityEPete]

You can bend the arm in the tank to read empty too soon or too late.

[happydude2012]

ok, were officially on red line today - 16 miles to work, still fuel in the tank.

lets see what happens

[Bat]

Hi,

There seems to be a lot of people with wonky fuel gauges in this post!

I'm confused, I've had several mini's over the years and don't remember any giving me an empty reading with 3 gallons of fuel left, in fact most rarely got filled above half full in the first place!

Cheers 

[neon1991]

He's not posted to say he got to work yet 

[gazza82]

I hope the OP isn't just going to run it dry ,,, that could cause more problems if it sucks up the carp in the tank into his SU!! I'd never want to run out in a classic due to the fact so many don't have good fuel filtering systems ..

[happydude2012]

Got to work ok - were now dead on the red line - looked in the tank, flippin loads of petrol in there.

Im not going to run it dry don't worry.

 

The satnav test was a success on two fronts, firstly, I was pleased to see im actually driving at the right speed, actually, my guage is a bit over cautious and running about 3mph over the sat nav.

And it was 16 miles bang on to work.

 

 

Ive also come to realise that several factors have been in play all along.

Bought the car of a well known mini guy in the midlands about 7 years ago, I think, he put 12" wheels on it without thinking about the speedo calibration for sale purposes, maybe it had 10 or 13" before.

Also think the double binnacle set up is ******* and I need to go aftermarket.

 

I might syphen my petrol out tonight to see how much is left at zero on the gauge, unless anyone can think of a better way

[Bat]

Hi,

I'd stick a can full in the boot, run it out and put half the can in to get you home.

When you get home take the sender out and adjust the arm.

Cheers 

[CityEPete]

If the float on the sender arm has gone porous it will sink giving a lower reading, my new one had a rubber ring that swole up after two weeks.

[dotmatrix]

fit a cheap inline plastic filter. they get surprisingly brown inside.

[gazza82]

3 mph over isn't bad .. similar to my modern. I think all cars are allowed up to 5mph .. and they are always fast otherwise the law suits for "you got me a speeding ticket" would be crippling. So if you think you're doing 70 but really that's 68, then you shouldn't get done.

 

If the tyres were correct the swap from 10 to 12 should not have altered things too much but you have lots of unknowns like the final drive, etc you also need to take into account.

 

 

The important thing is it's something to do with the gauge or sender at this stage ..

 

 

I hired a Moke in Barbados many moons ago .. overnight it lost half a tank of fuel .. until I noticed I had the only one without a padlock device .. yup, nicked!

Edited by gazza82, 22 August 2018 - 03:36 PM.

[GraemeC]

Drain the tank completely.

Put a new sender in as a matter of course, then you're not starting with one that could fail anytime soon.

Put a gallon back in and then start to adjust (bend) the sender arm until it *just* shows a reading off empty.

 

Nothing wrong with the later style binnacle if everything is working and matched.  Aftermarket will take just as much effort to set up.