smehta

So on the way home from work, realized I forgot to fill up. But still had 34 miles driving distance on fuel remaining.

Planned to stop along the way to home, where I know gas station is near to HWY. Kept a close eye, in case I need to take an exit sooner. Made it to my planned exit, and by the time I reached the Gas station - RX350 showed "1 Mile" of driving distance left on available fuel.

So how much fuel is really remaining?? Enough for 10 miles? Or really just 1 mile?

I don't want to try running it out of gas, thats not the point. Just want to know how much grace period there is before we're screwed. So as to not push the envelope.

tfischer

The car computer driving distance warnings, and the little red light gas gauge warning, are almost always calibrated to understate the fuel remaining. But don't generalize from how other's cars are set. Over the course of the next month or two, fill up the tank when the needle hits various points on the gauge and compare the fuel purchased to the tank capacity. This will give you a good ideal of the offset built into your gauge, which is helpful. I think you will find that there is usually about 2 to 3 gallons in the tank when the gauge reads "E," and half the tank capacity plus 2 gallons when on "half." I seldom pay much attention to the "cruising range" readouts as they can be off by over 50 miles.

Alpy64

I never pay attention too but when orange light os on, on the 400h there was approx. 12liters remaining.
On the 450h I did not try yet!

RXSF

Cars nowadays really don't want you do run out of gas. Even when it says 0 miles I would get there is still at least a gallon. This is my own estimate and not for record. When you hit 1 miles left you should have taken note how much gas you put in to compare with the tank capacity

TheSnowman

As others have said, take notice of how much it takes to fill up. Our RX-350 in Australia usually takes 64 liters when all the warnings are on and there is only 1 kilometer left.

From memory, the tank capacity is 72 liters, so there is still some safety built into the settings, best thing is, they are very consistent, so find your regular point to fill up compared to the gauge reading.

Have a nice week end.

UCSB

Two days ago, I drove my 450h down to 0 miles remaining on cruising range. Then pulled into a station and put 14.8 gallons in my car. Since the car has a tank capacity of 17.2 gallons, I still had up to 2.4 gallons. So I had probably at least another 60 miles of range left. This matches my prior experience where I typically only need 10 or 12 gallons to fill my tank when I typically refuel.

[Note - the 350 is setup differently with a 19.2 gallon tank.]

InRBigness

I was heading down to the states for some parcels the other day and my Left to empty range was 24km'swhen I left, and the trip was about a 110 Km;s. Wnen I got over the border into the Excited States to buy back our much lower priced gas it only took aboiut 15 US gallons. I figured if I wanted to I could have driven back home but with the difference in price of almost $1.50 a gallon that would be silly.

Relax and know that you can exceed the DTE that is posted.

billy44bo

Can you get every drop of gas out of the tank or is there a point were you can no longer pump the fuel out of the tank and you might still have a gallon or two left in the tank? I known the the tank capacity is17.2 gallons for the 450h but what is the total amount that can be used by the fuel pump?Do not think that I want to find this out I never let the light come on in the first place. I fill up at 1/4 tank eveytime or before if I find a very good price for fuel.

tfischer

Billy makes a good point. Even with a gallon or so in the talk, the pump may not be able to reach it, and you are stranded. Letting a tank get much below the one-fourth mark is just not worth the trouble, and I cannot think of an instance in which it might be necessary or advisable to do so.

m1964

Modern vehicles designed so that the computer would shut off the fuel pump before it runs out of gas completely-electric fuel pump these days are being cooled off by the gas they are pumping, so running out of gas completely would cause overheating FP-not a good idea to have heat source in the gas tank. It appears that RX is designed to show "true" mileage/amount of fuel remaining before it would shut off; unlike my old LR2 that showed exactly how much fuel was left in the tank, but it would shut off before running empty (I did not run empty but some one reported running empty when gage showed 1 -2 gallons left...)

smehta

Thanks to everyone for your comments. Point taken - try to fill up around 1/4th tank.

I will try to avoid running the tank down to a low level for the sake of convenience. The comments re fuel pump make good sense.

Art3

There's also the potential for a good deal of crud to be sloshing around at the bottom of the tank. Those posters that have suggested not letting the tank run down past 1/4 are right on.

happy1977

It makes me wonder, if we're worried about what's on the bottom of the tank, where exactly is the feeding tube (the tube where it'll get the gasoline to the engine), is it at the bottom of the tank? If that's the case, it wouldn't make a difference what's on the bottom of the tank, right? Plus, isn't there a filter before the gas is pumped into the engine?

It's not the RX but just an illustration assuming new cars are similar in concept

Sevn86

Ever since i bought my car 14 days ago the three times i needed gas i was already at E with the screen showing low fuel. I still drove about 20 miles before I got to the gas station.

ejm3

I try to fill up sooner rather than later simplye becuase it makes me feel better to "only" put $50 in gas in the tank rather than $75 ;-)