Don't know if anyone else has noticed this but:
I use a LOT of fuel during the day in our company which we have to account for by mileage/gals used and cost. Today, one of the trucks was running very low on fuel so I grabbed a 5 gal can to fill and bring to driver.
At the gas station I was filling the can to the 5 gal mark, when it got close to that mark I looked up to the amount/cost and was stunned to see that I had just pumped 8.72 gallons into a 5 gallon can. I still had about another gallon to go! The pump read correctly but the actual volume was almost half of what the pump display was indicating! Net result, I paid $7.02 per gallon! Complaining and showing the station manager was a waste of time. I was only getting 5 gallons, what about all the other consumers at that station getting litterly half of what they are paying for? I now long for those old time pumps that measure the fuel above the pump and then gravity feed to the tank.
We have noticed in the company a drop of about 33% in average mpg since this gas crisis started with no change really in vehicles except for the 7 catalytic converters we have had to replace due to the different chemical makup of some of the fuels....mainly ethenol additive. Mechanics at Ford and Dodge stated to us that the emmission systems were not set up for what we have gotten, they did have a tollerance window that was evidently exceded. I digress, with the fuel issue I notice that the problem seems to occur when the pumps are going slow, i.e. when slowing down for a preset sale....most credit cards and stations preset to 75.00 so the last dollar is pumping slow....probably ripping you off. From now on, if a pumps seems slow, I stop. I thought it was more than odd that I was putting 27 gallons in a 24 gallon fuel tank recently... when I had a 1/4 tank pulling into a station.
Anyway, I hope to just alert so no one else gets any more pain at the pumps than necessary.
Angelo
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