“…that extra gas probably isn’t going to make it into your tank anyway. It’ll likely get stuck in the hose or the pump’s vapor recovery system, or just dribble on the ground as you return the nozzle to the pump.”
Really? Ain’t never had no gas get stuck in ho.se.
Manyears ago as teens we wouldrain the hose. New nozzles will not allow that.
It is a different time, you aren’t a teen anymore, people rarely pay cash for gas, and your car’s vapor recovery system does NOT like you topping off.
So stop at the first click.
I’ve never found rounding up to be a problem. All within reason of course.
In the case of the pump stopping at 34.87 I would round up to 35.00. If it were 34.23 I would stop at 34.25 instead of 35.
Wife and kids have always done this with no issues also.
Rounding up 5 cents back in the early 70’s could dump another 1/6 gallon of gas in the tank. Rounding up 5 cents today - it’s less then 1/20th a gallon. Far less chance of doing any damage rounding up when gas prices are higher.
In any event, with most customers paying via a credit card or a debit card nowadays, there is really no reason to “round up” the amount on the pump unless someone is paying with cash.
I round up to the nearest nickel, $34.87 to $34.90, etc. A penny’s worth of gas is about half an ounce, roughly 0.46 ounces at $2.799. If I round up three cents it’s 1.37 ounces. My wife, OTOH, just pumps gas until it shuts off.
I admit, I top off habitually. Never had a problem with an evap system, never had to replace a charcoal canister. It’s my understanding on on most newer vehicles the hose that runs from tank to the canister is typically routed from the top of the fuel tank anyway, so the chances of doing any harm from topping off is minimal.
I have to admit that I always run the gas again after it clicks off; I have no intend to round up to nearest anything… I do it because in the past, on two separate occasions, the pump clicked off, and I thought it was full, only to get back on the highway and find the gas gauge reading no way near full. Yeah, I was not paying much interest to what the pump was doing, I was walking around the car, checking tires, cleaning the windshield, checking oil, etc… By the way, when I leave the pump handle on auto-fill; I do not set it at the highest setting. Made that mistake once and the auto shut off did not work and gas was spraying all over before I got the pump handle… And when I do the double fill, the second one is by hand and I’m listening for that sound of gas coming up the filler tube.
In the 1960’s the gas pump shut off valve was at the pump end of the hose, so a little gasoline was still inside the hose after the fill. I’d routinely see teenagers go to every hose at the gas station, tip the hoses and drain the gasoline, yielded maybe a 1/4 gallon of gas so they could continue their evening cruise. Nobody as far as I could tell, even the gas station owners, seemed to mind. Just one of those things teenagers did. 1/4 gallon of gas would have cost less than 10 cents. Modern pumps , the shut off valve is now at the car end of the hose, no way to drain it out.
1960’s cars, if overfilled, the gas would just run onto the ground. Fire hazard definitely, but not damaging to the car’s internals otherwise. A modern car overfilled, the evap canister and various evap system valves can get flooded with gasoline and damaged, and cause all sort of problems. Best avoided. The evap systems in modern cars do improve the overall air quality I expect, so its a worthwhile compromise imo.
Years ago answered a newspaper want-ad.
Older woman seeking companion to drive her car to Phoenix. (Then I would hitchike on to LA to find a friend’septic tank access cover under his lawn.)
I wasleep when she got off the planned route.
Awoke witho idea where we.re. Had to look athe stars to discern bearing.
Fuel gauge on empty!!!
Found a closed gastation and emptied hoses into her gas tank.
Coasted down grades iNeutral. Followed semis in their vacuum.
After midnight finally came upon an open gastation.
PlumBob
When we were kids (1960 or so…) and we needed gas for our mini-bikes, go-karts, or lawn mowers, we often raided the local gas stations to drain their hoses. And to think we used soda bottles and beer bottles to hold the gas… This was also the era that if a kid ever had a flat tire on their bicycle, every gas station would fix it for free.
After I started driving, I knew when a pump hose had been drained, when you turned on the pump, it would crank off a couple of cents, refilling the hose…
But luckily for me during that time, most gas stations just turned off their pumps when they closed at night and did not put a lock on the pump handle. I was driving home really late one night on my motorcycle. I had forgotten that I had run out of gas earlier and switched over to reserve. And as expected, I ran completely dry, even tilting the bike towards the reserve valve did no good…
So I start pushing my motorcycle home and it’s over 20-miles and back then there were no all-night gas stations, but I’m hoping… I figure I’ll run out of steam long before dawn and I’ll just have to wait for a station to open.
I make it to a closed station and I’m hoping the pumps were not shut off and I lift a nozzle and find no pressure, but then I remember I tilt the nozzle over, open the handle a bit and gas starts running out.
I’m able to get enough gas from their pumps to get to the next closed station, I do it again and only have to push the bike a short distance to the next station and do it all over again. I did get home long before dawn and swore that if I ever hit reserve again, I would immediately hit a station…
My '84 Sporster’s teardrop tank only holds a bit over 2-gallons and because I run my bike rich, I have about an 80-mile range. I carry two 1-gallon gas cans in my saddle bags when I’m out cursing with my friends and oddly enough, I’ve never needed to hit these reserves, but a couple of my friends are sure glad I’ve carried them…
^ Plastic bags of gasoline in vehicle trunk in China?
In China, the sidewalk vendors decant fresh beer (unpasteurized) from their cold beer keg into a very thin plastic bag in which to take itones apartment.
Must be careful thathe bag does notouch anything and split open.
Wife doubts thathe bags are food grade.
The raw beer was delicious!
Cold filtered beers are UNPASTEURIZED.
1-10. What are “cold-filtered”, and “heat pasteurized” beers? (stason.org)
Most of your craft beers are Cold Filtered.
As usual the comments are not the same so take your pick. I never continue filling up after the first click. And I reluctantly hold my tongue when someone at the next pump is continually putting more gas in.
In school my Pontiac wouldn’t start one morning. So we walked next door to the gas station and drained a pop can full of gas out of the hose. Dumped it in the carb. Bad idea. Ruined my rain jacket putting the fire out. Car started though after that. The fire must have warmed it up. Not recommended for novices.
Been there done that lesson learned the first time and not forgotten.
For anyone thinking to try this, as I’ve done before when the truck’s carb is completely dry, just a tsp of gas is usually enough.
Back in the 1960s, when I worked in various gas stations as a teenager; when you could pull in, say, “fill’er up,” and you also got your windshield cleaned and your oil checked, I always got a kick out of the drivers who took “great pride” in pumping their own gas. Back then, almost all gas purchases were in cash. It was funny to watch these “self-pumpers” try to hit an even amount to avoid paying with pennies or receiving pennies in change. Since they only filled up every week or so and they probably went to whatever gas station was convenient, they never developed the “touch” on the pump handle as we did who pumped gas all day…
I would watch a self-pumper fill up and hit $4.27 (gas was 25-cents ((24 point 9)) a gallon back then…), and then hit the handle again, $4.28 point 5, then one more time and it would roll over to $4.31, curse and try to hit $4.35…
(Oh, don’t cry about the cheap gas then, minimum wage was only $1.10 then…)
I would offer to top it off for them and most would say, “Thanks, you know what you’re doing…” but some would say through clenched teeth, “I can do it…”
One time, I had to physically take the hose away, the guy was so intent on watching the dollar amount that he did not notice that he had completely top off the tank, and every time he tapped the handle, a little gas spilled out onto the ground. He was so pissed that when he paid, he told me to keep the 7-cents change…
(Woo-Hoo, got a candy bar with that change… Now you can cry, “3 Musketeers” Candy Bars were on 5-cents back then…)
Drive Smart, Drive Safe…
I worked at a gas station in that era too. Did you have self-pumping customers who drained what gas was left in the hose into their tank after the pump shut off? Very common at my station.
Oh yes, that was very common for the self-pumpers to drain the hose. Admittedly, I was one of them. Especially when I hit the handle to reset the gauges and to turn on the pump and it clicked off a cent or two because it had to fill the hose…
Now, buried in some other topic, that I wrote about months ago, I wrote about using the tip 'n drain technique to get home when I was out late, late at night on my motorcycle when I was a teenager in the 1960s. I had obviously run the normal setting dry and switched over to reserve and never bothered to fill it up. I ran out of gas, late at night, actually very early in the morning and where I lived, all the stations were closed. An old trick is to lean the bike over real far on the reserve side and you might get a mile or two out of the dregs…
I barely got it started… So I start pushing and I got to a station and luckily the pump handles were not locked. I fished an old oil can out of the trash and drain the two hoses. It was enough to get me a few miles and I’m pushing again, not far, but this time the pump handles are locked. Some more pushing and another station, but with 6-unlocked pump handles. I had kept the old oil can and I was able to drain enough to get home.
I never ran on reserve again. In fact, my '84 Ironhead Sportster has only a 2-1/4 gallon tank and when I’m taking a long ride, I carry two 1-quart gas cans loaded in my saddlebags. I’m way too old now to be pushing that bike.
Side-story, when I was teaching my son to ride, he was on my '74 Honda 400 Supersport with 4-cylinders and 4-carburetors. We were on a side road and I had him shut the fuel flow off so he would experience what the bike felt like when it ran out of gas and how to quickly switch the fuel over to reserve.
However, the bike just kept going and going, we soon have numerous cars behind us and we now are back on a major highway. My first thoughts are to get my son, a new and inexperienced rider, off this main drag and then his bike decides it’s out of gas. My son panicked a bit, forgetting he shut the gas off and he’s trying to get over onto the shoulder with several drivers blasting their horns at him and speeding around him. Finally, he remembers he shut the gas off and switches it back on. A few seconds later, the bike fired up and we quickly made our way home.
Second epiphany, besides: do not run on reserve, practice the emergency fuel switch over on a really lonely road…
As for the Photo below… The pump on the left is one of the old “Tip 'n Drain” type, it shows 19-cents a gallon (Waa-Hoo…). The Pump on the right was the type still in use at our local gas in up-state Pottersville, New York; then, a logging town, in the Adirondack Mountains in the early 1950s. That type of pump, you hand-pumped the gas up into the glass bowl at the top and then gravity fed it into your tank. I remember folks back then ordering gas by the gallon since the bowl was only marked in quantity.
So as they use to say, “Happy Motoring…”
