Low Fuel Warning

kenchan

lol. i too usually just pump gas when i pass the 1/4 tank mark.

ive had driven it down to when it does the countdown but i dont trust it much. plus i keep staring at it and so it's a distraction while driving.

BrianMSmith

Your "remaining" range depends on how you drive the car over a long distance. It is calculated from an average and is not valid for only a short distance that is not necessarily representative of the average. Imagine if you are averaging 25miles/gallon on a long highway trip, then exit for the last 25 miles of your trip, with 25 miles on your "remaining" range you then have 1 gallon left. But now off the highway your mileage is only 12mpg, so you run out when the range still shows about 12 miles. I suspect Nissan doesn't want to be blamed if you run out when it still says 5 miles to go, so they blank it out, probably when you have something like 2 gallons left.

JACKPAC

I know from personal experience that you can drive at 55 mph for 20 miles after your car tells you you have --- miles left. I think I had 1/2 gal. left at fill-up. I wouldn't rec. doing this, but I had no other options at the time.

ProfessorDave

When that alert comes on the ugly yellow screen you'd think the car had blown its engine, or the country was under attack, or there was a sale at Harbor Freight!

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fullmonty

Mexican actually

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sonic370

i agree gas gage is terrible in the 370. its beyond ugly i hate that yellow sign that pops up.. anyway at two dots mine says 50 miles left which drops fast
after that.. once without a choice i did drive about 30 miles with it at -----
but thats not a good idea!

Jessobear

That actually sounds about right. When you car tells you you're out of gas, you probably have a gallon and a half left. All cars are designed that way to prevent people from running out of gas all the time. One of the reasons I never fill up until the warning comes on.

The best running out of gas story ever was in college my friend and I were driving my '87 Integra to Lake Havasu. When you cross over from Colorado into Utah on I-70, you see a sign which literally reads "next services 110 miles". For some reason, I assumed that I had enough gas to make it. Finally ran out of gas 20 miles from the nearest town, up in the mountains. As luck would have it, I ran out right at the highest elevation. We pushed the car for about 50 feet, jumped in and coasted the car for 12 miles down the mountain. Then we had to hitch a ride the rest of the way.

n1cd

Found out today that most of the new Nissan do the same in all modles.

reechwuzhere

You are so right about the fuel starvation. The first time it happened, I didnt put two and two together. I had it towed to the dealer and on the way off the truck it started right up. So tonight on the way home from work I really lay into a long right handed on-ramp and half way through, there goes the power. So I'm sitting there on the side of the road like WTF, I take off the negative cable thinking a computer reset would fix it, but it didnt. So then a hgihway assistance truck pulls up and a dude jumps out and we talk about the problem and he asks, are you out of gas? I told him no way, I know for a fact that there's a 1/4 tank in it. So he puts a gallon in anyway, and the car starts right up.

Now, I can understand that maybe they put the pickup on the far right side of the tank and hard right turns starve the pump but, how come after the car was flat again it didnt prime itself? It needed 1 gallon of gas to reset? It just doesnt make sense... Could the baffles be keeping the fuel away from the pickup once it happens?

Anyway, I wont be letting her get below 1/2 tank again.

I'm just glad that I found someone else who has seen this.

c41006

It freaks me out every time

zmyride

happened to me too. i posted the same question sometime ago.

even when it flashes "---", there's still about 2 gallons left so good for another 30-40 miles.

i always drive until no dots left. I like to live on the adventure side.

jaedub

i always wait for the "---" mark lol. I know its risky but It turned into a habbit

WorkinMan

I have an Xterra that gets spazzed out over getting low on fuel. The Frontier I traded in had a trip computer that was actually pretty good with the math of "miles left to empty", but the guage itself would drop like a Japanese dive bomber once it went past 1/2 full heading towards empty. It seemed to take forever getting to half full, though. I think Nissan lets the dropouts do the engineering on fuel quantity on community outreach?

ChrisSlicks

Yep that Commerce Cares van bailed my *** out too. It was an older guy wearing a Corvette jacket who was pretty friendly. Make sure you mail in that comment card so that they can keep the program running.

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doublea2527

I've been reading a lot of posts on this, and i never have the same problems with my fuel gauge as anyone. I recently went on a trip to Florida and my fuel gauge came on saying I had around 40 miles till empty and it accurately went down each mile I drove. When it said ---, I pulled off on an exit and filled up with 18 gallons or so, which is about right. Assuming --- means you have about 1 gallon left. Only problem I've ever had with the fuel gauge is when I fill up sometimes the last dot doesnt light up, but a quick off, on reset fixes that. That would make me mad not knowing how many miles I have left.

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