Yesterday, I drove for quite a while with zero miles showing in the "Distance Remaining" display. I was driving from NY to NJ, and I thought I'd fill up with the cheapest gas in the country when I got there. When the gauge indicated just 8 miles of travel left, I began getting nervous. I checked the GPS, and it said there was a gas station 2 miles away. That must be as the crow flies because it took me half an hour to get there - and it was closed. Eventually, I found an open station and got 8.8 gallons, so I still had a safety margin, but not much. I had no bars showing on the gauge, and I must have driven ten miles with "0 miles" showing in the display.

 

There are a few threads that discuss this. The computer is pretty pessimistic on its calculations. For example today, I filled up with no bars (I don't know the range, I didn't check) but it only filled up 9.4 gallons and got 44.8 mpg. I still had a little more than gallon and could have pushed the miles driven passed 422.9. Oh and is nice to fill up at $1.91 a gallon!!

 

In our digital world people are used to everything being accurate to three decimal places. Even aircraft totalizers aren't that accurate and they use dedicated in-line sensors to measure fuel flow.

The Fit's computer uses injector open time to estimate fuel usage. It's not terribly accurate, but that info is already in the car's computer. Honda fudges the data a bit to make sure that nobody runs out of gas with miles remaining on the display.

 

Imagine if it worked the other way - ran out of gas with 5 miles showing.

 

That's easy- drive through the flatlands until you're near E, then go uphill to find a gas station. Your mileage at the tail end of the tank isn't going to be anything like the beginning was.

I don't like playing chicken with a dry tank. I do it all the time, I just don't like it.

 

Two bars is my limit - when I can find a station, but at least I know I have at least 30 miles left after it shows 0.

 

Closest I have come is 12 miles to go, and we filled up with just over 8 gallons. At the time I was biting my nails hoping I wasn't going to have to push...


It was only a few weeks before that I stopped to help a couple on the side of the road with a 2014 Subaru Outback. They ran out of gas with 32 miles showing before E. Thankfully I was in my truck and doing manual labor at a friends house, so had a full gas can in the bed.


I honestly don't like the estimated miles to go. Would rather just have an old fashioned orange needle that points towards F or E. That digital readout we have blends into the dash.

 

I don't like it either, as I keep obsessing over why the estimated range changes to drastically. That's why I don't display it, or the MPG... I found that I was obsessed with those numbers when they were displayed, so I just turned them off and now I'm only displaying the trip distance and total miles.

I fill up when the fuel gauge is at one bar.

I still check the MPG from time to time, but it's not up by default.

 

I just do the mental math to guestimate my range. If my projected MPG is 44 and I know that my tank is a little over 10 gallons, I can assume I'll get over 440 miles on the tank. So I can safely wait till 400 miles before having to fill up.

The miles to go display is useless to me. My other car was just as bad at predicting.

 

I'm a fan of gauges too, and I like to have a low fuel light. That lets me know that there is a certain amount remaining and I can plan my gas strategy accordingly. Heck, even my '66 Mercedes 200D had a low fuel light so it is hardly high tech!

It seems that the modern dash has more flash and less information than the old school stuff.

 

You know, of course, that the Fit does have a low fuel light right?

 

Watch how the "Range" changes as you drive. I was going into town yesterday, and it said I could drive 197 miles on the gas ion the tank. After going down a couple of hills, the distance jumped to 223.

 

Yes, but it also has that terrible bar graph display. Analog quantities should be measured with an analog gauge, not a pseudo-analog bar graph.

 

Reminds me of Microsoft Window's progress report that says the requested operation will take 8 minutes and then jumps to 15 hours.

 

So last night I filled up with the fit telling me I only had 2 miles before I had to start pushing. I was thinking of you guys as I filled up and the pump stopped at 9 gallons. With my average of 39 mpg I could have gone nearly another 60 miles before getting out. Thankfully that fit is pretty light as far as cars go and pushing it would not take nearly as much effort as it would on my truck.


Happy trails everyone,

 

Pushing it wouldn't be too bad, but having to keep running ahead and making steering corrections would be tough.

 

WAG (Wild Ass Guess) vs. SWAG (Scientific Wild Ass Guess), right? Both my former Suzuki SX4 and my 2015 Fit EX had the little orange gas pump light and a button to give estimated range to empty. Both pump lights came on at an estimated 30 miles remaining. Once the estimate reached 0, another 30 miles was safe, but the pucker factor increased with each mile. The Suzi had a slightly larger tank and it had all the right parts to make it "sporty", but unlike the Fit, it wasn't "toss-able".

 

I had mine down to zero miles and empty with no bars just the other day. But here's the weird thing, I put about five gallons into the tank and it still reads empty and with zero miles of range left.


I'm ignoring it completely, but it is kinda funny driving around with a car warning of no miles remaining and not being concerned.


Not sure what's going on there. I'm not too concerned over it and find it kinda funny

 

My daughter got my old 1995 Lincoln Town car and when she took me to the store one day I seen the gas light was on and told her she better get some gas quick. .She said "Don't worry dad it says we got 9 miles left" I told her that it's just a guess and to stop at the first station we see. Electronic gauges don't always get it correct. They can change too as time goes by.

 

I had 2 miles showing last night, but from past experience, I knew that I had at least 50 miles available. When I finally filled up, it took 8.5g, so there was lots of mileage left.

I've been taking lots of short, hilly rides in the newly-arrived cold weather, and my mileage is dropping. I haven't posted the last fill-up on Fuelly yet, but I know my average will be dropping till spring arrives.