Wow, first time happened to me (in my Max at least) and it was unexpected. The out-of-gas light had been on for like a day, but the needle wasn't so far down for me to worry. I only had to go about half a mile to the Arco up the road. So I start up the car, and I go for about two blocks, and the car just dies on me! Yikes. I couldn't really steer but brakes worked. Lucky for me it was like 1:30am and no other cars around that street at the time.

Anyways, I was pissed! Since I didn't like the prospect of walking to the gas station and lugging back some gas, I tried to start the car and it restarted. I went umm about 20 feet before it died again though! Argh, so I start it up again and go another block and die on the freeway overpass. Still no cars around me, whew!

Getting to the point of pissing in my pants, I start up again, and due to some holy power or the fact that the car was a bit uphill or something, I managed to make it the last two blocks to the gas station, even made a left turn and coasted to the pump.

Moral of story: umm, don't run out of gas. Well maybe if I didn't drive so damn fast I wouldn't have run out of gas at that specific moment, but that's another story altogether. :P I don't even wanna think what woulda happened if I was on the freeway. If you are curious, one other time I almost ran out of gas in my Max, I could tell because the car kept lurching when I accelerated. I went to the nearest gas station that time and made it fine.

 

Just wondering...cause auto is bad when that kind of thing happens...
I try not to get out of gas..

 

I don't think that running out of gas is good because you may be pulling any "crud" or leftovers from the the bottom of the tank. I don't think it's good for the fuel pump either.

 

So how far can one go once the light comes on? Or better yet, does anyone know approximately how much gas there is left in the tank when the light comes on? I've gone maybe 15 miles with it on, but I don't really want to test the limits.

 

ive heard 20 miles ? - i try not to let my tank go less than one quarter left.... if that happens i apologize to my baby and get 94 cuz i feel bad - =P

 

i refill mine at half way

 

you guys fill up at 1/2 tank and 1/4 tank
please, i never fill mines until the needle is even or below the "E"
okay okay i maybe nuts.. but i always like to see how much miles i get to a tank..


I've only gotten stuck once and that was with my 2nd 85 max
the silver one..

so get this .. it was 2 in the morn and i'm outta gas..
luckily my uncle lived nearby where i was ..i go to his garage .. empty the gas out of his lawnmower and take whatever he had in the gas bottle and dump it into my car..
LOL...
he never found out... and it was enought to make it home..

Ant

 

Definately a bad move. You may have done some damage to your fuel filter. Not only were you sucking all the dirt & crud out of the bottom of your tank, in our cars the gasoline serves double duty by acting as a cooling agent for the fuel pump/fuel filter. If you literally ran out & restarted several times, its likely that you've "cooked" the fuel filter. I'd spend a few bucks and change it. Its cheap insurance.

Regarding the low fuel warning light, our cars generally have about 2.5 - 3 gallons left when the idiot light comes on.

 

Booker you said they have 2.5 to 3 gallons left

I go to the pump to fill up every week and my needle is even with the "E" and it take anywhere from 15.5 to 16.5 gallons.. so that means there's still 2.5 gallons left..
thas at least 18 gallons.. ???

how big is the tank on the 4th gens anyways ?

Ant

 

18.5 gallons

 

I ran out of gas on I-75 in Tennesee one time -- just crested a big long hill and the car sputtered out, so I shifted into neutral and just started coasting downhill. Had passed an exit sign about 1/2 mile before cresting the hill, but it was 2 miles so I had 1-1/2 to go! I at least figured I'd coast as far as possible so I didn't have to walk as far, but the steady decline kept me going all the way to the exit! As if that wasn't cool enough, at the bottom of this exit ramp there was a stop light (rather than the usual stop signs in that area) and it was just turning yellow when I got to it so I cruised on thru. Since power steering and brakes were gone, I basically just stood on the brakes until I came to a stop in the parking lot, and then someone helped me push it to a pump. It was nuts, man. Now that I know I've used up my one out-of-gas saving grace, I'm much more careful about it.

 

In my 95 Max, I remember the light turning on and immediately slowing down to pull a u-turn to go back for gas. I stalled out during the u-turn. I'm not exaggerating.

/aac

 

Something was DEFINATELY wrong with your car. I mean - why have a warning light?

 

Change out the fuel filter and you should be fine.

 

When my gas light comes on, I have around 2.5 - 3 gallons left. I've gone 50 miles with the gas light on before, and still had at least 1.5 gallons left when I filled up.

The lowest I've ever gone is to refill 17.8 gallons. This was with the light on steady (it goes on and off at 3 gallons, then steady on at 2.5 gallons).

I usually like to run my tank until the light comes on too, just to see how far I can get on one tank. Once (during a blue moon) I got 400 miles to one tank! And the light didn't even come on!

 

just like ant, i never refill befor the needle goes below E. My low gas light came on so often that i think it went bad...it dosen't light up anymore even when i have less than 1 gal left.
the only time i ever ran out of gas was when i went back to taiwan for two weeks and the needle was way on the bottom. When i came back, i guess the rest of the gas just vaporized...

 

I think JJW mentioned one time that gas does foam up when you're filling. So 16.5 gallons actually take the volume of 18 gallons. Just a thought.

 

I drive my car on empty all the time. Runs great, drives great. I do change my fuel filter once a year though. You can drive this car for ever with no gas. Holds 18.5 gals. Supposedly has a 2.5 gal reserve which is what you have when the light comes on. So if you get 30 mpg on the highway then you can go about 75 miles once the light comes on. I've gone over 50 without running out. Also, i've gotten over 500 miles to a tank of gas. It was all freeway when i moved to atlanta from n va. I was folling my friend in his truck with all my furniture so was only going about 70 the whole way, but i had like 510 miles when i got gas.

 

Wow, I must have a special Maxima. My gas tank holds 70 litres.

:P

- Andrew

 

I read a while back that the gas tank size is 18.5 gallons. I always fill up the tank when it reaches empty(light turns on once or twice). The pump on the station says about 15-16 gallons of fuel pumped. I thought Nissan was bull****ing with the 18.5 gallon size, so if Booker is correct 2.5-3.0 gallons are left when the light turns on.
I usually get 320 miles per tank. The most I ever got was 490 miles on a long trip at about 85mph.

 

Welp, thanks for the replies! I'll change fuel filter soon! Umm as for when the warning light goes bad, I've found that I can go 50 miles easily after it turns on consistently. The most I ever pumped at a station was 18.1 gallons.

As for my old Datsun 510, my dad (original owner) and I drove so much with gas low that the light eventually went dead. So be forewarned! :P

I shoulda pumped it full after I ran outta gas, but the stupid Arco was sorta busy for 2am, it was raining (gee, rain in Seattle, hmm...), and I wasn't quite in the mood.

I'm sorta suspicious of Arco pumps sometimes as well, since my Dad was able to pump more than the stated gas tank capacity, by about .2 or .4 gallons. And I remember his tank wasn't like extremely low. They do have some kind of government regulation on this kind of thing, right?

 

Oh yeah, one more thing, my max is auto.

 

What is the correlation between running out of gas and having an auto tranny? None..

 

Drove from southwestern CT to Toledo Ohio once on one tank of gas in my old auto 96 SE. Cruise control on about 75 the whole way, all my stuff in the car(going back to school in the fall). I got 560 or so miles, and probably still had a gallons worth of gas left to go. Mileage worked out to be 34.xx. Of course, almost immediately afterwards, I put in a stillen intake and got 12 mpg while testing it out, so everything evens out in the end