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[grc]

First, anyone who tries to squeeze the last mile out of a tank of gas before stopping to fill up is just asking for a little exercise as he walks to his destination, or a little wait after he calls his auto club.  Running the fuel down to fumes is not a highly recommended way to operate a car or bike.

Fix the actual gauge so it reads correctly, and you don't need to worry about how accurate the little miles to empty display is or isn't.  Once you know, like I do, that you have "X" gallons remaining when the gauge reads 1/4 for instance, it doesn't take a genius to figure out roughly how soon you need to find a fuel station.  Somehow most of us managed to avoid constantly running out of gas long before they added low fuel lights and miles to empty displays to vehicles.


Jerry

[Twolanerider]

Somehow most of us managed to avoid constantly running out of gas long before they added low fuel lights and miles to empty displays to vehicles.


Jerry

Jerry, they're called idiot lights and worry gauges for a reason.

[Grizzly]

... and how do you spell relief?

I spell it, S H E L L   

[crackers]

I know with the bike only having 423 miles that I haven't reached the pint of seeing the best yet but with the fuel gauge hitting empty yesterday at 152 miles I pulled off at the next pump to see how much was left. The tank took 4.6 gals so at that point I set the gps fuel gauge to 180.

[sixgun95]

First, anyone who tries to squeeze the last mile out of a tank of gas before stopping to fill up is just asking for a little exercise as he walks to his destination, or a little wait after he calls his auto club.  Running the fuel down to fumes is not a highly recommended way to operate a car or bike.

Fix the actual gauge so it reads correctly, and you don't need to worry about how accurate the little miles to empty display is or isn't.  Once you know, like I do, that you have "X" gallons remaining when the gauge reads 1/4 for instance, it doesn't take a genius to figure out roughly how soon you need to find a fuel station.  Somehow most of us managed to avoid constantly running out of gas long before they added low fuel lights and miles to empty displays to vehicles.


Jerry

Well said!

[UFO_HOG]

I have almost 30k on my bike and I have been using the mileage remaining mode most of the time and have figured it to be very accurate. I have never not been able to figure out how much fuel it will take to fill it.

You can even go 18 miles after it says 0 left.... (Don't ask me how I know) 

[Big Red]

Here is what I documented this past week.  Fuel gauge was on full 'E' but low fuel warning light had not come on.  I toggled the odometer button to get to the 'r' display which shows the range left for available  fuel and it read almost 80 miles.  I continued to ride and finally the low fuel warning light came on when the range function showed 27 miles.  I filled the tank and got 5.4 gallons.

I would think that both the fuel gauge and the range function would gather their data from the same source - the fuel level sending unit.  Since the range function and the low fuel warning light seem to be reasonably accurate I am suspecting a malfunction in the fuel

I have had my 2012 cvo ultra for 2 weeks. Weather has been crappy so it has taken this long to use the first tank of fuel the dealer gave me. I noticed the same thing, my fuel gauge was on E but i still had 65 miles according to the range. My low fuel light never came on  i stopped and put about 4.2 gals in.  With a new bike i did not want o run out of fuel.

[JCZ]

It's different with each bike.  Terrie and I have both gone 20 miles on a couple of occassions.  Jon went about 25 miles this past weekend.  Like all the other gauges that Harley has......they're qulity control motto is "close is good enough".

[Deep Blue Dives]

First, anyone who tries to squeeze the last mile out of a tank of gas before stopping to fill up is just asking for a little exercise as he walks to his destination, or a little wait after he calls his auto club. 

Very sound advice.  So many factors affect the mileage at any given time.  Are you in the city, on the highway, is it windy, is the bike loaded down with gear, are you running it harder than normal? 

I ran out of gas on my softail, heavy wind, little lady on the back, gear loaded down.  Light came on, I knew that I have about 32-35 miles to hit a gas station......first time I road under all those conditions at once......passed 3 exits with no highway gas station.....near huntsville, TX (state prison for the bad boys)....coasted to the curb in 104F heat (Girlfriend was 210F Boiling Hot). 

Got lucky and was picked up by a highway service patrol on my walk to the service station - took only 20 minutes to get enough fuel to make it to the next station (girlfriend was a bitching 210F by then) - never run it that low again, nor trust any gauge on a Harley.

I noticed on my CVO with that little mileage gauge, that estimated milage  will jump all over the place  unless your cruising at a very consistent speed - immediately set the counter to my current mileage on that tank.

[Raptor]

It's different with each bike.  Terrie and I have both gone 20 miles on a couple of occassions.  Jon went about 25 miles this past weekend.  Like all the other gauges that Harley has......they're qulity control motto is "close is good enough".

I think the same company that makes the ambient temperature gauge makes the gas gauge.

[Montanakid]

The light  on mine comes on consistantly at 200 miles.Unless of course I'm getting on it . Best we did was going from Las Vegas to the Grand Canyon and with a strong wind at our back the light came on at 240, I went another 20 and filled up. Now on the flip side when Leaving Vegas and coming back against the wind, which on that day was the worse I ever went through the light came on at 165.You could almost literally watch it move  to empty.So I use trip meter and around 200 miles I start looking for a station.My 03 fatboy,  after 3 trips to the dealer to fix, as it would stick on full b I'm happy now to get some semblance of a working gauge.
In all my vehicles I try to use mileage as a gauge instead of the gauge as I just don't trust them.But that's just me.

[Puzzled]

I think the same company that makes the ambient temperature gauge makes the gas gauge.

LOL 

[sixgun95]

This week I toggled the odometer button to get to the 'r' display which shows the range left for available  fuel.  It was perfectly accurate I think, at r34 the low fuel light came on and the bike took 5.2 gal of fuel.  The dash gauge on the other hand was at zero for at least 50 mi before the low fuel light came on.