Awkward Petrol Flaps

[Hippea]

What cars have you experienced with the most awkward fuel fillers?

Back in the day it seems like little thought was given to the ergonomics of fuel flap location, the Mini Metro stands out, you basically need to sit on the floor to fill up

[ajprice]

Waits for TVR owners with the petrol filler in the boot...

[LandieMark]

The Jaguar fillers on the rear quarters were a pain. I'm thinking XJ and XJS convertible. The XJs had two of them as well.

I remember a garage refusing me fuel with the Chimaera until I shut the boot until I showed the jobs worth behind the counter the filler.

[sixor8]

That's happened to me several times with TVRs. They come out to check I'm not filling up a fish tank or something in the boot. The local S'burys are used to me now.

[mac96]

Hippea said:

What cars have you experienced with the most awkward fuel fillers?

Back in the day it seems like little thought was given to the ergonomics of fuel flap location, the Mini Metro stands out, you basically need to sit on the floor to fill up

I don't remember having difficulties with a Metro but Ii was younger then!

[miniman]

LandieMark said:

I remember a garage refusing me fuel with the Chimaera until I shut the boot until I showed the jobs worth behind the counter the filler.

Yeah I’ve had that a few times.

[Hippea]

mac96 said:

Hippea said:

What cars have you experienced with the most awkward fuel fillers?

Back in the day it seems like little thought was given to the ergonomics of fuel flap location, the Mini Metro stands out, you basically need to sit on the floor to fill up

I don't remember having difficulties with a Metro but Ii was younger then!

I don’t have personal experience but it seems so low!

[georgeyboy12345]

Lamborghini Miura, though it’d be a nice problem to have

[Hippea]

I did have a petrol station shut off its pumps a few years ago whilst filling up a 1954 VW Beetle, the young attendant thought I was pouring petrol all over my engine..

[Sheepshanks]

Hippea said:

I did have a petrol station shut off its pumps a few years ago whilst filling up a 1954 VW Beetle, the young attendant thought I was pouring petrol all over my engine..

I worked in a garage where a woman came in in a Beetle, opened the engine cover and insisted the young lad attendant put fuel into the engine oil filler. He knew it was wrong, but still did it!

Put two gallons in and then the woman tried to start the car! Amazingly nothing bad happened - car just didn't turnover.

[Sebring440]

Sheepshanks said:

Put two gallons in and then the woman tried to start the car! Amazingly nothing bad happened - car just didn't turnover.

The starter motor knew there was fuel in the sump?

[finlo]

Hippea said:

What cars have you experienced with the most awkward fuel fillers?

Back in the day it seems like little thought was given to the ergonomics of fuel flap location, the Mini Metro stands out, you basically need to sit on the floor to fill up

The fuel used to piss out of them during hard cornering all over the rear tyre causing you to spin out, raised up on later models.

Edited by finlo on Saturday 7th February 22:34

[HJG]

C3 Corvette is annoying (and frequent).

[Dapster]

My mum had a mk1 Polo which I inherited when I passed my test in the late 80s. The petrol attendants (remember them?) would aways wrestle with the air vent on the rear C pillar before figuring out the cap was behind the flap

[Jehu son of Nimshi]

Back in the day I had a Fiat X1/9, where the filler was pretty much in the engine bay, facing upwards and right by the vented engine cover. Not inconvenient as such, but did cause me to panic once when a fair bit of petrol overspray made its way into the, by then pretty hot, engine bay via the vents!

[5s Alive]

Hillman Imp was interesting to fill up in stormy weather, holding onto the bonnet was a priority.

[Mr Tidy]

finlo said:

The fuel used to piss out of them during hard cornering all over the rear tyre causing you to spin out, raised up on later models.

Edited by finlo on Saturday 7th February 22:34

A workmate of mine had 3 recalls for his Metro. He solved the problem by selling it!

Looking back Mum's Fiat 600 with the tank in the front boot wasn't exactly a good idea, but possibly slightly safer than a mate's Series 1 LR that had the tank under the driver's seat.

Edited by Mr Tidy on Sunday 8th February 00:29

[mikeiow]

mac96 said:

Hippea said:

What cars have you experienced with the most awkward fuel fillers?

Back in the day it seems like little thought was given to the ergonomics of fuel flap location, the Mini Metro stands out, you basically need to sit on the floor to fill up

I don't remember having difficulties with a Metro but Ii was younger then!

I was just thinking “I had two mini metros back in the day & don’t remember that at all”

The second one did stop me from ‘servicing’ my cars though.
Drained the sump, then screwing the bolt in…& it kept going round: the thread was stripped

Had to get it towed to a garage….they pointed out they would try to put a bigger bolt in (helicoil), but if it failed it would be engine+gearbox time ‘cos they were inextricably linked.
No real idea how accurate that was, & their plan worked, but it taught young MikeIOW to focus on earning enough to pay others to service my cars

[LooneyTunes]

ajprice said:

Waits for TVR owners with the petrol filler in the boot...

That one just needs a bit of care to avoid spillage, but more annoying is the one on an Aston Vantage. They re electronically released but sometimes get slightly out of alignment making it a two person job to open (one to press the button, one to help the cover up with a credit card).

That s beaten though by one of my old Land Rovers where the fillers (plural) are under the front seats. You take the seat squabs out to get to the caps. Filling it completely is a PITA as you need to get the nozzle into both sides of the vehicle. I suspect most owners only use one of the tanks.

[The_Nugget]

finlo said:

The fuel used to piss out of them during hard cornering all over the rear tyre causing you to spin out, raised up on later models.

Edited by finlo on Saturday 7th February 22:34

Haha, yes! I remember this now.
Although it rarely happened to 17 year old me because I usually couldn’t afford to put in more than a tenner at a time.