8 replies to this topic

[MiniBonkerz]

Hi all had the mini a week now drives great love it only problem i feel i have is the fuel gauge here goes

I picked the car up it said half full so i drove to the petrol station and filled it up cost me £12.11 @99.9p pl anyway to cut a long story short i used the whole tank of fuel and yesterday morning filled it to the brim or as close as it would let me it only cost me £18.23 again @ 99.9p pl i have not kept a record of what mileage im doing but i drove it 40 miles yesterday and now the gauge is showing i have used more than a 1/4 of fuel can anyone shed any light on this or is it normal?

Chris

Edited by MiniBonkerz, 11 June 2009 - 11:57 AM.

[Jet Williams]

Sounds about right. Most readings from mini fuel gauges are 'approximate' at best, so what it says you have may not be what's actually in the tank. Having said that, if you used £18 in total, and you got 40 miles from quarter of that (£4.50) that's about what I'd expect. Mini tanks don't hold much more than £20 to fill up from the red.

Edited by Jet Williams, 11 June 2009 - 12:09 PM.

[Philly1983]

I just got my 1999 Cooper MPI early this week, filled up from half a tank with V plus costing around £12, have done about 90 mile and the gauge says just below half a tank.

Im not sure how many miles to expect but i read a old review about the Cooper's and it said that with a gentle foot you could expect 240 mile to the tank ? is this correct ?
Any how i am planning on filling up and running it till it runs out with a jerry can in the back so i can get a figure of what to expect, only thing is im sure i read somewhere that the backfire from the fuel running out can damage the CAT ?

[miniman retford]

On my mpi i find it drops slowly down to 1/2 tank then quicker down to empty but when the guage is below the empty line theres still a gallon left in
Better than the other way round & running out

Edited by miniman retford, 11 June 2009 - 01:44 PM.

[BGB]

my SPI does about 1Ltr per 10 miles. Roughly the same as my 2ltr Tdi Passat

[Jet Williams]

I think the fuel consumption tends to look worse than it actually is on a Mini anyway; most modern cars hold 55 litres of fuel, some larger cars more than that, so, on a visual level, you expect a to do a lot more than 40 miles on quarter of a tank. When you realise it's actually only £4 or £5 of fuel, it's actually quite good. Just a lot more frequent trips to the petrol station!

Mine only ever registers 3/4 when full, but runs down a good quarter again below the red.

[Cian 'the pain' MPI]

Thats the same with mine! Yeah you have to bear in mind that its only a 33 litre fuel tank, they do seem to drink the fuel especialy if the engine is tuned up

[Blatherskite]

I just got my 1999 Cooper MPI early this week, filled up from half a tank with V plus costing around £12, have done about 90 mile and the gauge says just below half a tank.

Im not sure how many miles to expect but i read a old review about the Cooper's and it said that with a gentle foot you could expect 240 mile to the tank ? is this correct ?
Any how i am planning on filling up and running it till it runs out with a jerry can in the back so i can get a figure of what to expect, only thing is im sure i read somewhere that the backfire from the fuel running out can damage the CAT ?

Thats not the way to do it, you risk getting all kinds of cr*p in the fuel system, running out in a crucial manoevre (dodging a truck?), plus where in a Mini is there space for a jerry can? Brim the tank, note the miles, drive until you are low (on the gauge) and brim it again, noting the miles again. Divide miles by the fill volume, gives you MPG. Total possible distance you can get is the tank volume less a few litres for slops times the MPG.

[The_Mistro]

Thats the same with mine! Yeah you have to bear in mind that its only a 33 litre fuel tank, they do seem to drink the fuel especialy if the engine is tuned up

correct, but that doesnt mean that 33 litres is what the gauge reads, the red line isnt when the tank is empty! if you look at the little E on the guage it is bellow the red line, so when we say the tank is empty, reading from the red line, we have about £10 fuel left in the tank!

also, as we have the fuel pump in the tank on the later minis, i dont know if the 33L rating is with or without the pump in there!