How far can you get when your final bar of gas is rapidly flashing?

[JerseyJeff84]

I believe the Yaris manual says that the rapidly flashing bar means there is 0.9 gallons of gas left in the tank. How many miles have you guys gotten out of it, if you were trying to squeeze every last drop? I tend to get really nervous when it starts flashing real fast? When it just does the normal, steady flash, I get about 15 miles until it turns rapid. Just curious.

[nemelek]

Hopefully I never find out. I have driven 20 miles on the fast flash. Put in 10.5 gallons. So I probably could drive 40 miles on the fast flash.

[marcus]

so far safe for me is 50kms but it might go more then again you shouldnt let it go down that low..gas is cooling your pump

[Hard_Yaris]

Ive been forced to make the final flashing bar last 88km one day.

[fnkngrv]

If you risk it you also risk frying your fuel pump. I can tell you that I have never really gotten there. I have my doubts about how accurate that fuel gauge is anyway because for me it has been very unreliable really. I have had the second to last bare JUST disappear and had to put in 10.2 gal and other times that happens and I put in 9.8 gal...not accurate in my book.

[CTScott]

As I've mentioned in some of the other threads on this, part of the inaccuracy of the fuel gauge is due to the fact that it uses raw battery voltage, rather than a regulated voltage through the level sender potentiometer. The lower the battery voltage, the more "optimistic" the reading. So the difference between the battery voltage with the engine off versus running can be +/- enough to flip a bar or instantly transition from slow fast to fast flash.

[yaris2010RS]

i go about 70km when the light starts flashing. i feel if needed too i could push it too 100km but only in a emergency would i ever do that

[Eatoman]

I did around 58km during rapid flash. I didn't want to risk going any further....

[Shinare]

I ran my poor yaris out of gas once when on a highway and no gas station in sight. I freaked out when it started flashing at me so I dialed in the nearest gas station on my GPS and followed its directions off the highway and was easily 10-15 miles into some woods. Bad part was when we got there the gas station was no longer there and it was a tiny one horse sized town. (population was MAYBE 500) We drove around trying to find someone to ask and once we did they just laughed at me and told me to go back the way we came. heh I headed back to the highway and once there headed in the same direction I originally was going. About 10 miles down the highway the engine died. Called my sister (who I was headed to visit) who lived about 60 miles away to come save me. Turns out there was a gas station on the highway literally 1-2 miles further from where it died (on the other side of a couple hills so I couldn't see it). If I would have stayed on the highway I would have made it easily.

STUPID GPS's!

[alch3miss]

I went once 482 miles and another instance with my liftback I went an estimated 495 miles when it started blinking. I have been wanting to travel a long distance trip with gasoline just to run it bare to see the total mileage.

[yarisdude447]

Please do not wait until the last bar until you add gas. It's just not worth the risk. My friend's old BMW ran out of gas and we broke down on the highway, and he had to pay for a tow, more expensive gas at the closest gas station, and a busted fuel pump. But if you do, you can probably squeeze 10-20 miles out of that last gallon, depending on how you drive.

[BuildCode]

During the summer I will go to the first flashing bar (I've never seen the 'fast' flashing bar). I know this may put more wear on the fuel pump, but I'm not too worried about it with 65k+ miles of warranty left. Besides, I've gone 408 miles without going down to the fast flash, that's pretty good if you ask me :)

During the winter (aka, now) I don't let it get to the first flash at all if possible, just because of things I've heard about getting condensation/water in the tank and stuff.

[why?]

there is no real way to know, as has been mentioned. I ran out of gas once and I went 444 miles, and I did get about 44 on the last bar.

[alch3miss]

I went 485 miles in my sedan.. A/T AEM CAI

[toyo]

according to my calculation it has 1.6 gal capacity, i've managed to get around 90kms on it.

mine is a 1st gen though

[AjanYaris]

This is an old thread, but I thought I would add my reply. I tested my 2012 1.33L Yaris and I drove exactly 100km after the last bar started flashing. And the full tank is about 44L.

[nookandcrannycar]

Originally Posted by AjanYaris

This is an old thread, but I thought I would add my reply. I tested my 2012 1.33L Yaris and I drove exactly 100km after the last bar started flashing. And the full tank is about 44L.

CTScott posted a later thread where he calculated the absolute capacity of the tank (12.8 gallons). I always fill my tank until I can see gas in the neck. I once (years ago) ran out of gas as I was pulling up to the pump, so I knew that level = 12.777 gallons and absolute capacity would not be much more than that (the rest of the neck). I keep the bar drop intervals from the current tank in my head to get a rough idea of how I'm doing on that tank. I've also put enough miles on my Yaris at different speeds to have a good idea how much my MPG will drop (up to 65-70 MPH) if I speed up.....so.....miles traveled on the current tank, speed, and experience with my particular Yaris play a much bigger roll (for me) than the accuracy of the gas gauge. When I've run out of gas (not that many times), each time I already knew I was cutting it very close and (for different reasons each time) 'pushed the envelope'.

[charles nelson]

I was 'convoying' with some friends in New Mexico. My Yaris had dropped to 1/4 tank. So I pulled over to get gas. My friends pulled up behind me but didn't didn't fill up. They had about 1/4 tank also. They explained that there was a gas station on our way farther on and they would fill there. A strong head wind dropped both our mpgs. When we got to the 'gas station' we found out it had burned down the month before. My friends were on fumes...their gauge registered below 'E'. I had to drive back to Santa Fe, and buy a gas can...drive back to my friends. We both then had to drive back to Santa Fe carefully so they could fill up. I still had more than 1/2 tank, but I got gas also. I carefully explained to my friends that from that point on...they could fill when they wanted...but I was going to continue even if they ran out of gas and had to sit on the side of the road for the whole night. (What was supposed to be an afternoon drive turned into an all night excursion).