Don't count on your reserve.

[KraZ440]

I was reminded today about how I should plan as if the reserve in the fuel tank doesn't exist.

Before I left the house this morning, I took my usual look at the odometer and estimated how many miles I had left before I hit the reserve. I knew I was going to need to switch to reserve before I got to work. Since I was running late and I assumed that my reserve would be more than enough to get me to work, I chose not to fill up with gas. Instead, I decided to fill up as soon as I leave work (there are two gas stations a block from my office). I started the bike and took off.

Half way to work, my bike started to sputter. No problem, I thought. This was about where I expected to have to switch to reserve and I figured I still had more than enough in reserve to get me to work. I switched to reserve and kept going.

Well, about a mile down the road, my bike started to sputter again. Disbelief set in. There was no way I was out of gas! It must be a fuel flow issue that will clear itself up soon. The engine continued to sputter, so I decided to get off the freeway at the next exit. Lucky for me I did.

Halfway up the off-ramp, the engine died and wouldn't start. I pulled in the clutch and coasted as far as I could. Luckily, I was able to coast to within a block of a gas station before I had to push the bike.

After all this, I hope that I've finally learned my lesson: Always fill up before you think you'll hit reserve, because there may not be any reserve.

[NCDave]

You must have some other problem, because reserve is always reserve. you have as much gas in reserve every time you get down to it. Are you sure there isn't something else wrong?

[KraZ440]

Anything is possible, since the bike is 25 years old, but the only thing that makes sense to me is a clogged fuel filter in the tank.

After I filled my tank, I rode to work with the petcock on reserve without any trouble. Also, I've recently ridden most of the way home from work on reserve. I've even ran a tank full of Seafoam though it recently. I always get reasonable quality gas (never from the bottom tier discount stations). If there is a problem, I'd like to find and fix it. Any ideas?

[gr8ride]

Good work on getting a block away from a gas station. Running out on the freeway could have been the worst!!! hmmm, my guess would be some kind of blockage or your reserve is not much lower than your regular fuel level and you ran it until you had fumes left.

[KraZ440]

Originally Posted by gr8ride

Good work on getting a block away from a gas station. Running out on the freeway could have been the worst!!! hmmm, my guess would be some kind of blockage or your reserve is not much lower than your regular fuel level and you ran it until you had fumes left.

I'm grateful that I've learned to recognize how my bike responds when it is getting close to running out of gas. I've seen other threads on this forum where the first sign that people recognize is the engine dieing. If I had let my engine die on me, I would have been stuck on the inside shoulder of the freeway. Not a pretty sight.

I've gone 15 miles on reserve in the past. The service manual says that I have a 12 liter tank with 2 liters as reserve. When the reserve lasted only a mile (approx. 165 ml or 2/3 of a cup of gas) I was taken by surprise.

I think NCDave is correct. There's a problem somewhere. But I believe the lesson still holds. Don't count on the reserve being there. There could be any number of reasons that would cause life to not go as planned. In this story, it was an issue with my fuel system. In another story, it could have been a detour or a closed gas station.

[Da_Honest_Truth]

i learned this lesson the hard way. only i as riding around and didn't realize mine was already on reserve. it sputtered on me a few times, stopped once, but i was no where near a gas station.

got off, flipped the switch around a few times, made a mental note of where the next closest station was... got it started and kept riding. for what ever reason, i passed the first gas station, thinking i can make it to the one closest to the house, fill it up and be on my way. well i think my bike figured out that i was about to pass a 2nd one,and died again on me on the spot. lucky me i felt it lurch forward and pulled in the center divider. i tried flipping the switch again to see if i could get it back started, it didn't want to, so i ended up having to push it across two lanes of traffic into the empty lot next to the gas station. let it roll down a hill, it cranked, i went and filled it up. made a note of how many miles i had ridden.

even still with my 250... i again felt the bike lurching, but couldn't reach down to switch it over to reserve, so as i approached the gas station, i turned the curve, and was about to turn in before it stopped on me. again... had to push it to the pump and got it filled. i know sometime this month going to have to take it to the shop. i wanna get a service done on it. i got 179 miles, but then again i'm still not sure if i filled it up all the way. so i'm prolly going to go fill it again later on today just to make sure, and start over with my trip odometer.

[NCDave]

Kraz, perhaps your petcock is bad and it's running on reserve all the time regardless? Or perhaps it never actually switches to reserve? I gotta think it there is a problem that's got to be the location of it.

One thought was that maybe you have crud in the bottom of your tank that blocked the reserve screen, but if you ran it in reserve, that shouldn't be the case.

When you ran out, did you slosh it around and could you tell if there was any gas in it?

[KraZ440]

Originally Posted by NCDave

Kraz, perhaps your petcock is bad and it's running on reserve all the time regardless? Or perhaps it never actually switches to reserve? I gotta think it there is a problem that's got to be the location of it.

One thought was that maybe you have crud in the bottom of your tank that blocked the reserve screen, but if you ran it in reserve, that shouldn't be the case.

When you ran out, did you slosh it around and could you tell if there was any gas in it?

Thanks for the ideas.

I didn't slosh the tank around listening for gas, but I was only able to put 2.5 gallons in a 3 gallon tank, so I'm pretty sure that there should have still been some there. I'll play around with the petcock some, to see if I find anything.

One more idea. I recently added an inline fuel filter between the tank and the carb. Perhaps there is something wrong with the plumbing?

[CTRider]

Originally Posted by KraZ440

Thanks for the ideas.

I didn't slosh the tank around listening for gas, but I was only able to put 2.5 gallons in a 3 gallon tank, so I'm pretty sure that there should have still been some there. I'll play around with the petcock some, to see if I find anything.

One more idea. I recently added an inline fuel filter between the tank and the carb. Perhaps there is something wrong with the plumbing?

Perhaps your new net caught a real wopper...

I can go at least 25 miles on reserve. SOmething would have to be seriously wrong if I didn't get that much.

[KraZ440]

Originally Posted by CTRider

Perhaps your new net caught a real wopper...

I can go at least 25 miles on reserve. SOmething would have to be seriously wrong if I didn't get that much.

It would have to be HUGE to plug up my new filter. Originally, the filter was for a VW, so it has lots of surface area.

I was fully expecting something more than 15 miles on my reserve. 25 miles should be doable, based on the tank specs, but I have no plan on finding out the hard way.