Hi folks. I have a MY00 Octavia 1.9 TDi (110) and i've ran it rather low on fuel. The light came on yesterday and the garage near home was closed this morning, i've done 52 miles since the light came on, just gone to the garage and it spluttered for a second or too so i killed the engine and pushed it the last 10 yeards to the pump. Cue lots of from the staff!

I should add that when it came on i'd done roughly the right kind of mileage from the previous fill up as i would expect to get normally.

Anyway, i filled up and put 47 litres in the tank, it's started and run fine on the 2 miles back to the office, except the fuel indicator needle is now stuck at 3/4 mark.

Questions:-

What is the tank capacity? (ie. is 47 litres about full, or have i short-filled)

Could running it down to beyond the red cause the sender to stick?

Cheers folks.

Tank capacity is 55L and you can squeeze a couple more in if needed using a trick with the vent nozzle.

It might be stuck because you didn't actually fill it, due to air in the tank not being able to get out quickly enough. If you look by the filler there is a nozzle you can push that will let the last of the air out but you shouldn't need it.

The other things you might have is that either the fuel was foaming lots due to the very empty tank or some debris has got trapped in the float sensor (if it still is one of these) in the fuel tank stopping it's movement. This of course assumes your care was stuttering because there was no fuel rather than just stuttering because it was starting to pick up the dregs in the fuel that was left.

Personally I'd go and try to fill it up again and see how much more you can get in now the tank has had a chance to settle.

Edited 16 October, 200916 yr by cheezemonkhai

55l is nominal tank capacity. On diesels, if you remove or press during filling the vent valve in the filler neck you can get another 9l in, so max amout of fuel you can ever take is 64l. But normall fillup will only give you 53l-56l total. On correctly calibrated sender (VAG-COM Adaptation Group 30 in Instrument Cluster), you should get fuel low warning when you have 8l of fuel left in the tank

If you ran out of fuel and then you were able to put only 47l in, chances are that your fuel pickup assembly has a problem.

Otherwise, it might be that you had more than enough fuel, the warning came too early at 16l left, and you just talked yourself into shutting engine down, having still 8l in the tank.

In this case, the fuel level sender likely has a problem, because it showed you low level fuel warning too early, and it does not show correctly the full tank now.

In any case, I'd inspect and clean the fuel pickup in the tank, and the fuel level sender attached to it. I'ts relatively easy to get access to (3 philips screws and one largeish ring to unscrew underneath the seats, and 2 quick-clip connectors for the fuel lines).

Make sure your fuel level in the tank is low though, otherwise you will have a massive diesel spill.

Thanks for the reply both of you. Are you sure that the older 110 TDi's had a 55 litre tank? Ever since i hade mine, i've only ever got 40-46 litres as my standard fill-up. I have to keep a record of all fuel receipts for work so have records of over 100 tanks now! If so, i definitely have some form of issue restricting the amount of fuel i can get in the tank as it's been very consistent in terms of what i get in.

I fill up with the warning light as much as i can, but sometimes i'll fill up with between red and quarter as i have a long run to do, i have never filled up on half or more. Just done a scan down the litres column on 100+ tanks and the most i've ever squeezed in is 45 litres....

Hi

I was wondering this as well, i have had a 2003 110 octavia for just over a year now and the most i have ever got into it is 50 litres and that was fuel light on 0 left on the computer. .:confused: The manual says 55 litres, maybe it needs resetting or something.

I normally fill up when the computer reads about 35 miles left and the average over the last 15,000 miles was 45 litres to refill to the nearest whole number of litres after the pump cut off..

Last month I had to do a cross country diversion with no fuel stations so when I got into a town and refilled, the computer was alternating between 0 and 5 miles left in the tank. It needed 47 litres to fill to max again.

Looking at my refuelling data, I have filled with 47 litres several times before, once with 48 and once with 49. For the latter, I remember that I forced in as much as I could as I was at a supermarket soon after the start of a 300+ mile journey. My conclusion is that you could probably add 2-3 litres (maybe more) by trickling in fuel after the normal pump cut-off.

I wonder though how much fuel there is in the tank when the computer reads 0 miles left and the gauge read empty (which it did). When Top Gear did a trip from London to Scotland and back, their car computer and gauge were on zero for for quite a distance before the target fuel station was reached. I won't be testing this as my nerves won't stand it!

My conclusion is that 55 litres is not a usable tank size and at least 5 litres is used as dead space to catch impurities etc.

My conclusion is that you could probably add 2-3 litres (maybe more) by trickling in fuel after the normal pump cut-off.

I always fill my car to a round pound value. Pump stops filling, and I generally find I can squeeze in up to 2 more litres, if play slowly and gently (while pi$$ing off the people waiting behind me to fill up :P)

I'll have to check back on my receipts but I am sure that I have pretty much filled my car to the capacity at least one.