True story....I'm in the car, and for some reason it occurred to me to check the see how much gas I have left..... and ummm I forgot where that indicator was. Seriously it took me a good 5 seconds to find it.
I've had the TCH for 9 months and I actually looked at the location of my old Camry's fuel indicator. Wow!!

No old jokes......this car makes you forget about getting gas.
Frankly I never put gas in the TCH until 2 days after the gas light goes on....I suspect that I'm eventually going to burn that bulb out.

Byron

I can appreciate your post - in my Murano when the light came on I had about 35 miles before I truly had to fuel-up otherwise risk calling AAA.

With my new TCH the fuel light goes on, I drive for another 30 miles, pull in for fuel and get ~ 14.5 gals to "top-off" on a 17.2 gal tank - so I'm still learning how much more I can go without getting nervous.

Too bad the Nav screen & Speedometer Display shows "0" miles right after the fuel light comes on - I can see calibrating off to ensure you're really not a "0" but it seams like it comes on with ~ 3-4 gal left...

Nevertheless...what a great car...

Tom

07 TCH Blue Ribbon Metallic / Ash - w/ light blue/yellow pinstripe
Options: Leather, Moonroof, Nav., C&C package
Added -Toyota: Rear Spoiler, Body Side Molding, Rear Bumper Applique, Camry Mats, Door Sill Enhancements
Added-Other: Sirius Starmate4, BilletAmerica Mirror Chrome Pillars; Color-Keyed Mud Guards



HSD Community Reason #12439
http://www.toyota.com/vehicles/minis...ids/index.html

Wife's whip - 07 Pontiac G6 GT Convertible - Crimson Red / Light Taupe

You do realize the fuel input might just be positioned 3 gallons above the bottom of the tank to prevent sediment from being ingested into the system. Just because the tank holds 17+ gallons doesn't mean it can use all 17+ gallons.
I always chuckle at the folks who try to suck their tanks dry. You know the ones, the ones carrying that can of gasoline along the side of the road back to their car.
I guess it's one way to make use of that AAA membership.

I always wondered about that - when I was a kid, I had an aunt in a panic because my grandma was driving her car with the gauge slightly below 1/4 tank, and I asked what the big deal was, we had plenty of gas left, and she went off on me about sediment in the tank. Now, she's a bit insane, but it did stick in my head that one should never, as a general principle, let the tank go below 1/4 (which just makes sense anyways, cause you never know)

More recently, though, I thought to myself that assuming that the tank drains at the bottom, any sediment-forming minerals in the tank would be the first thing to go, in theory, so the sediment thing has more recently struck me as being logical at a glance, but not holding up to scrutiny.

Anyone familiar with gas tank designs able to confirm or deny? It doesn't make a lot of sense to me to design a tank to hold 2-3 superfluous gallons which never get used - if I found myself out of gas in a desert, and knew that there were a few gallons in there that the **** car couldn't get at, I'd be hunting down some automotive engineer when I got back to civilization, methinks...

They use to (maybe still do) sell a quart or two bottle of "emergency fuel" for dummies who run out of gas. It's just a liquid that is heavier than gas and sits on the bottom of the tank when you add it through the filler tube. It just "raises" the level of the normally unusabable gas sitting at the bottom of the tank. You can bet your bottom dollar there is gas in the tank that Toyota doesn't want you using.

I often drive 30 to 50 miles past "E". The most I've gone is 80 miles past E, and that tank used 16.1 gallons to fill up.

Odd your MTE shows 0 miles right after the fuel light comes on. I normally have 35 to 40 MTE showing when the low fuel light comes on. I don't have NAV, just the reading from the MFD.

The problem with the sediment argument, is the fill pickup is located at the bottom of the tank AT ALL TIMES. We don't have floating fuel intakes, so if there is sediment on the bottom of the tank, the amount of fuel in the tank has NO bearing on whether you suck up that sediment or not.

The ONLY reason to not run your tank too low is the fuel pump. The intank fuel umps actually used the fuel to keep them cool. if you run the tank too low repeatidly, you run the risk of overheating it and ruining a fuel pump.

That being said, I have gone 120 miles past 0 DTE on multiple occasions.

As a rule, I try to get gas before I hit the 100 miles past DTE 0.

If anybody actually doubts the location of their fuel pickup being on the bottom of the tank, I suggest you drop a tank and see for yourself. On my truck, the pickup is actually a flexible foot that puts pressure on the tank bottom so when it is full it still makes contact with the tank bottom. (The plastic tank swells a bit with the weight of the fuel in them.)