Fuel Gauge Not Lighting All The Way UP

slo

Well after owning the car for under 3 weeks and about 5 fill ups, the fuel gauge miraculously lit up all the way. go figure...

Next fillup same thing, all lights do light up....

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Cmike2780

@xdeslitx

Dammit! FML. You were right. Filled up this morning and first light didn't light up. This is soo annoying.

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[09][MB][6-Spd MT][Touring][Stillen Gen III][K&N][Borla CBE][Evo-R]

Cmike2780

Travelled over 100 miles and the gauge doesn't go down at all...stuck on one dot less than full and the range keeps going higher instead of lower. Thank god I reset the trip meter when I filled up. Looks like another trip to the dealer.

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[09][MB][6-Spd MT][Touring][Stillen Gen III][K&N][Borla CBE][Evo-R]

Hi-Step'n370Z

Look on the bright side. Now that the weather is warming up we can go back to the Roadster top tear issues. That should help to take out minds off the gas gauge issue for a while.

Augustus

My gauge started doing this same thing this weekend. 6k miles on the car, July '11 build MY2011.

Was out of town and down to about a quarter tank, filled up. Got in and immediately noticed the last dot wasn't lit. I'd seen this thread before and thought, "oh $#I*". Then I drove home, ~140 miles. The fuel gauge never changed! Just filled it up again at a local pump, and it took about 5 gallons. Really topped it off. Gauge is still at one dot below full. The gauge has seemed quite accurate over the past 6K miles.

Is it temperature related? This weekend is the first weekend where I've owned the car in actually hot weather, 95+ degrees.

Is the "stuck" gauge the same cause as the "won't-read-full" problem?

Looks like I'm in for my first Nissan 370Z service.

rudi

Don't let them pull your dash apart, its the sender unit. Mine was replaced and it's been good since.

Cmike2780

They insisted it was the cluster and not the fuel sender. They replaced the cluster and it all lights up so far...it's only been a couple of hours though. We'll see....

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[09][MB][6-Spd MT][Touring][Stillen Gen III][K&N][Borla CBE][Evo-R]

jikhead

Mine has been showing signs of issues these last few weeks/last 3-4 fills up. When I fill up, there is always 1-2 lights not lighting up to indicate a full tank. I also encountered this weekend it saying 1/2 a tank on Saturday, then 1/4 tank on Sunday...after only driving 5 miles. I topped it off at work today to double-check, and same thing. So I took it in at lunch. They didn't want to take my word for it and said I have to bring it back when fuel light is on, and they want to go fill the tank up. My gauge clearly had one light not lit up and I only drove about 10 miles from work to their dealership.

Is there any service bulletin on this?

LakeShow

Maybe it's a 09 issue?

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|2013 Audi S4|Ibis White/Black|S-Tronic P+|
|2013 370z|PearlWhite/Persimmon|Touring/Sport/Nav|F.I. CBE 18" CF|
|Sold|2011 370z|Gun Metallic|Touring/Sport/Nav|

jikhead

I've been fighting Nissan USA and a dealer for weeks now on this, and have had nothing but resistance. The service advisor has straight up lied to the customer support rep about what she visually saw, and completely denied anything was wrong with my car. I've gone around in circles with the service advisor, the mechanic, the service manager, and the customer support lady at Nissan USA. What it has all boiled down to, is that no one is willing or wanting to make a judgement call/management decision to have my fuel sender unit replaced.

I have now taken it to the dealer across town and they are going to replace it. My current problem is whether Nissan USA is going to pick up the tab on everything or at least the labor; as I told them from the beginning that I was willing to pay for the parts but that I refused to pay for the labor charges as the problem started within my warranty. They have been pushing me further and further out of warranty by not making a decision on the matter.

I even posted photos on their Facebook page visually showing the problems that could not be ignored or denied....only to have them immediately taken down. This whole experience has left a very negative impression upon me about Nissan. I will definitely never return to the one dealer.

Cmike2780

Two tanks and the last light still doesn't light up. I knew replacing the cluster wouldn't work, but I had a scratch on my old one anyways. The rep suspected "it's probably not the fuel sender", but it is likely the fuel sender. Nissan should really do a TSB for this. The guage kind of inaccurate until you get this fixed. I was showing 4 dots left, but was about 16 gallons when I filled up (19 gal./16 dots =1.19 gal. per dot; should have been around 14 gallons?). Basically saying that I think there's less fuel in the tank than what the guage is saying. It does seem to effect the bottom range also. I'll see if it's the same on the next fill-up. If others can confirm this?

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[09][MB][6-Spd MT][Touring][Stillen Gen III][K&N][Borla CBE][Evo-R]

Augustus

It's a long shot... but perhaps try a bottle of Lucas Fuel Treatment?

I generally do not believe that these "octane boosters" and "fuel treatment" things really do much of anything. But . . .

1) My wife's DD is a 2010 Subaru Outback with about 60K miles. Last Fall, we noticed that the fuel gauge began stopping just below the "F" mark on fill-ups. Sound familiar? The gauge seemed accurate otherwise, so we decided that we'd look into getting it fixed (out of warranty) if it got any worse and would otherwise just sort of ignore it. It irritated me, but it was her DD and she didn't care as much. A month or so later, I was at a local AutoZone (like a PepBoys, etc) and they had this Lucas Fuel Treatment on sale at the checkout counter for like $3. Never used it before but thought, what the hell, right? Couldn't hurt anything. Added it and filled up the Outback. No change. Gauge still below F. Also no change in MPG, idle quality, or any of the other things it says it does, of course. But at the next fill-up, I'll be damned if that fuel gauge didn't go all the way to (and slightly past) the "F" like it used to. It's kept working normally ever since, going on 6+ months now. I'd sort of forgotten about it. This was before I bought my Z, so I didn't know anything about similar problems with Z's. Did the Lucas stuff fix it? I have no idea, but it sure seems like it might have. It was certainly worth $3, anyway.

2)So when I remembered this yesterday, I went out and bought another bottle for the Z (not on sale, $5) last night. Pulled into my garage with an already topped-up gas tank and the last LED not lit. Added the stuff, drove around a few miles. No change, not lit. This morning, to my surprise, all of the LED's are lit, as they should be. Perhaps fixed? Perhaps just coincidence? I know others have experienced intermittent behavior, so I can only assume that it won't stay fixed. But perhaps this stuff does have some sort of lubricating property that "helps" sticky sender units. No idea, I'm not a mechanic or chemical engineer. Time will tell...

Perhaps worth $5 for someone else to try and see if it makes a difference on your Z. Especially for those out of warranty. It couldn't hurt, anyway.

roy'sz

It happens to me also! It also does depend on the levelness of the ground when you are filling up your car. If it isn't flad all the way around then your car will not have all led lights lit up (ie your on a incline with the passenger side higher or the nose is higher than the tail).

Cmike2780

^^ it's been tried. Most likely a coincidence. For me, sometimes it will all light up again, sometimes it doesn't the next time I start the car. Usually though, if it all lights up, it will act normally. The fact is, you can't really trust it to be accurate since there is some sort of malfuction/defect in the actual part.



Although that has a grain of truth, it isn't true for me. All the gas stations here are relatively flat and I've tried other stations. If this was true, I would have noticed this much sooner. It's the fuel sender. It sits on top of the tank and I think it means having to drop the tank to install. It's time consuming, which is assume why some dealers hesitate to fix it.172 Fuel Tank :: Fuel & Engine Control :: Genuine Nissan Parts :: 370Z Parts (Z34) 2009-2012 :: Nissan Parts, NISMO and Nissan Accessories - Courtesyparts.com

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[09][MB][6-Spd MT][Touring][Stillen Gen III][K&N][Borla CBE][Evo-R]

roy'sz

oh im not disagreeing with you at all. As a matter of fact, every time I fill up I top off almost a gallon and a half and the final led light is stil not lit. But I just track my mileage out of every tank to find out how much fuel I have onboard