The £5 fill-up

[Olivera]

Anyone else witnessing this at the pumps more often these days? First was a girl in a new shape Fiesta, on Saturday was a bloke in an Impreza WRX PPP wagon. My back of the fag packet calculations say that an Impreza might only get 15 miles of mixed driving for £5. Are some people with cars really that skint?

[carreauchompeur]

Fuel is becoming such a chunk of money, someone on low/minimum wage with, say, weekly pay would really struggle to budget for a full tank I reckon. It really makes me wince filling the A8 now.

[davepoth]

If the petrol station is right on your route to and fro every day, it probably makes sense to not brim the car, for fuel economy purposes. No idea why you'd do it otherwise though.

[RichyBoy]

Smart cdi, just put £6.50 in - which will do about 100 miles.

[vit4]

Guilty.

I tend to sort out whatever change I have and do it to that penny (e.g. £6.42). Used to do it to the fiver but just don't get enough now So try to do £6 minimum.

[BluePurpleRed]

The girl in the new shape might well be topping up to where she borrowed it from Boyf / Sis / Mum / Dad etc?

I remember doing that with my Mum's car. I guess this is when £5 bought 8 litres though in 1997-1998! I just used it at the weekends or when it was my time to be the driver of mates on a Fri night so could often be seen putting £5 in to get fuel back to where I borrowed it. Simpler than brimming it every now and then as like rounds in the pub it sometimes didn't seem to work out so better to just come back with slighly more than when it left the drive. My Mum didn't play the James May fuel light game ;P

[vit4]

RichyBoy said:

Smart cdi, just put £6.50 in - which will do about 100 miles.

Same amount gets me 30 miles if I'm careful

[v8will]

Haven't really noticed but I do notice alot of people dropping their Motorway/Dual Carriage way speeds from 80/90ish to around 60

[eltax91]

I did this in the Disco the other day. It's on ebay so i dont want it full, but needs a little in for test drives...

[boredofmyoldname]

carreauchompeur said:

Fuel is becoming such a chunk of money, someone on low/minimum wage with, say, weekly pay would really struggle to budget for a full tank I reckon. It really makes me wince filling the A8 now.

Id go along with this, the most I have put in the Volvo since buying it in December is 50 pounds. I haven't been brave enough to brim it because I feel it could lead me to view an empty tank as ruinous as a dead engine.

[lescombes]

v8will said:

Haven't really noticed but I do notice alot of people dropping their Motorway/Dual Carriage way speeds from 80/90ish to around 60

I have not ...YET..around here....... Q7 went passed me at a hell of knots yesterday (Sunday) as well as Range rovers and Jags.....

[carreauchompeur]

lescombes said:

v8will said:

Haven't really noticed but I do notice alot of people dropping their Motorway/Dual Carriage way speeds from 80/90ish to around 60

I have not ...YET..around here....... Q7 went passed me at a hell of knots yesterday (Sunday) as well as Range rovers and Jags.....

According to the instant MPG calculator on mine it's as economical at 140 as it is at 80mph

There's a clear message there!

[Daston]

I do it if its towards the end of the month and I only have to go a short distance

[Dog Star]

It is a bloody lot of money, but I'm just ignoring it - worrying and fretting won't help and driving like yer gran would probably save me a few quid a week. That said I don't go very fast on my trans-Pennine commute anyway - I stick at about 60 with the trucks, which is about the same as they average in the "Brake Test Lane (tm)" with their 90mph-BRAKELIKEfk-90mph-BRAKELIKEfk crocodile.

Another thing is that it starts making your other motoring expenses look quite cheap - a years tax on my SL500 = 2.5 fillups, ski holidy = 6 fillups, insurance = 5 fillups. A fill lasts about 3-4 days. It's mental!

[rottie102]

Up to the brim every time the reserve light is on. My time is much more valuable than few p saved due to lower weight. Plus all the food shoppers always piss me off when at the garage, so I try to avoid it.

[Drive Blind]

As mentioned above it could be the person is borrowing the car for a short journey.

When I regularly borrowed my dads car he would always leave the thing running on fumes. I would usually put between 3 and 5 quid to get to where I was going.

[rufusgti]

Dog Star said:

it starts making your other motoring expenses look quite cheap - a years tax on my SL500 = 2.5 fillups, ski holidy = 6 fillups, insurance = 5 fillups. A fill lasts about 3-4 days. It's mental!

This is a really good point. It's got me thinking. Its not going to have to go up much more before running a super super high MPG car aswell as your own car. Which then opens up what that car needs to be, if its not your daily. Its actually going to start working out cheaper to run 2 cars. My T4 surf bus would cost 100 quid to fill. Its just too much money.

[Drive Blind]

Also some people just work that way - they see filling up as a huge expense.

I used to work besides a guy who everyday visited the petrol station in the morning for about £7 of petrol and 10 fags.

I asked him one time why doesn't he fill the tank and buy 60 fags?

'Cos that would cost a fortune!' came the reply in an 'isn't it obvious' tone of voice.

[eldar]

I saw a diesel pump at the weekend, last customer £602.00!

[TRUENOSAM]

Could just be topping up the tank? I have to do this in my alfa because the feul gaugue goes crazy if it drops below 1/2