240 fuel tank capacity

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Olly R - 17 Mar 2005 10:57 GMT

Morning all.

I have a UK spec 1989 240 DL estate with the 2.3 carbed engine.
The manual says that the fuel tank capacity is 60 litres. The thing is, I
have never been able to put more than about 48 litres of fuel in the tank,
even when the fuel gauge is reading right at the bottom of the red bit.

So, _presumably_ the fuel gauge is misreading a little? I know that the
obvious thing to do is to take a spare can of fuel, and drive until I run
out, and see how many miles I've done, and see what the gauge is doing, but
I don't really fancy running out of fuel, even deliberately.

But, unless I've got a smaller tank than normal, I can probably dare to do
another 50 or 60 miles when I've got down to the bottom of my gauge?

cheers

Olly R

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Maarten De Munck - 17 Mar 2005 11:52 GMT

Olly R schreef:

> Morning all.
>
[quoted text clipped - 10 lines]
> But, unless I've got a smaller tank than normal, I can probably dare to do
> another 50 or 60 miles when I've got down to the bottom of my gauge?

With my '89 245 van (D24), I can drive at least another 100 km when the
needle passes the bottom of the red field.

The maximum I ever put in the tank at once was 59.somewhat litres, so I
suppose the 60 litres from the manual is quite correct. But when the
gauge enters the red field, only about 40 litres is used, and when the
gauge leaves the red field, about 50 litres is used.

I suppose it shouldn't be too difficult to adjust the gauge, but I'm
used to start thinking about looking for a gas station when the gauge
leaves the red field. ;-)

Groetjes,

Maarten

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Mike F - 17 Mar 2005 14:49 GMT

> Morning all.
>
[quoted text clipped - 14 lines]
>
> Olly R

I've put in the high 50s in my 240s. One thing to look for is the tank
being collapsed on the bottom - either from hitting something, or from a
bad charcoal canister which allows engine vacuum to collapse the tank.
(The latter problem usually is accompanied by fuel delivery problems,
especially on a carbed engine, although fixing the problem won't
uncollapse the tank.)

Signature

Mike F.
Thornhill (near Toronto), Ont.

Replace tt with t (twice!) and remove parentheses to email me directly.
(But I check the newsgroup more often than this email address.)

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brackenburn - 17 Mar 2005 19:57 GMT

Hi Olly,

It doesn't seem a good idea to run the tank dry. You may pick up a load of
guck from the bottom of the tank, especially from a fifteen-year old
tank........

Good Luck.
Andy I.

| Morning all.
|
[quoted text clipped - 14 lines]
|
| Olly R

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Michael Pardee - 18 Mar 2005 02:48 GMT

> Hi Olly,
>
[quoted text clipped - 5 lines]
> Good Luck.
> Andy I.

In addition, it is hard on the fuel pump. Seems we had a thread about a week
ago where the car wouldn't start after running out of gas and sitting
overnight.

Mike

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Alex Zepeda - 18 Mar 2005 22:01 GMT

> In addition, it is hard on the fuel pump. Seems we had a thread about a
> week ago where the car wouldn't start after running out of gas and sitting
> overnight.

This is a carb'd car. Shouldn't make a difference to the fuel pump.. fuel
pump should be super cheap to replace if it does fail.

Signature

alex

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Olly R - 19 Mar 2005 12:06 GMT

Thanks very much for all your suggestions.

Olly R

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