Miles after “E” (empty)
Ding! The fuel gauge shows no boxes. The “multi-information display” says “Add Fuel.” There’s a certain amount of immediacy to all that.
The first couple of times, I responded accordingly. I drove more-or-less straightaway to my “favorite” gas station and dutifully filled up the tank with gas. Eight gallons. “What the...? The tank holds 11.9 gallons.” That means there are three, four gallons of gas left in the tank. Mental math says that, worse case, at 40 mpg times 3 gal equals a lotta miles left after the fuel gauge shows “E.”
Estimating “empty” is tricky. The gamble is: How far do you want to drive on “E” before you really, truly, damn! run out of gas? (Running out of gas in a Prius is, uh, exciting. Details here.) In other words, how much gas is in the “reserve” tank. Fact is, I’ve been wondering about this since posting a scatter diagram showing how many miles I travel on a tank of gas.
Time for another scatter diagram. This one shows how many miles I’ve driven after the fuel gauge showed “E.” (Yeah, geekish; I’ve been recording this information, too.) On average (i.e., according to Excel), I drive another 38.90267 miles on “E.” (Yessiree, Excel can be just as fun as Quicken for the anal repulsive.) This chart shows that I often drive another 70 miles after “E.” Driving another 80 miles is not out of the question. Beyond that, well, I need to ask myself, with my best Clint Eastwood accent, “Do I feel lucky today? How far do I want to walk?”
