I drive mine daily without. If you have an odometer you can figure out how many miles you can go on a full tank and just keep track of it. Leave yourself a few extra miles for safety. I don't have a working odometer so I just stop for gas every so often and run out from time to time. A gauge is on my list, I'm just not there yet. The stick method doesen't work for me because of the filler neck location.
I have a 55 Ford and have been using a stick for about 4 years now ! I replaced the gauge and the sending unit and still haven't figured out what the problem is . I have the car torn down now and replacing the wiring harness along with all the gauges so I am sure that will take car of all the problems . Retro Jim
I just put a fuel gauge in my spun aluminum tank a few months ago. I hole sawed the proper size hole, used a sender from New Vintage. It has a metal plate that is thin metal. I could form the plate to match the curve of the tank. Self taping screws and the rubber gasket finished it off. It so much nicer to know how much gas is left. No more writing down the odometer readings and forgeting to look at them!!
Drive mine the same way, writing milage and odometer then allow about -4 mpg then wtite the estimated mileage but I carry an empty gas can so I don't have to another one after walking a couple miles. I must have about 16-17 gas cans by now
If you have more than one potential pickup opening, hook up both via a selector valve. Add a tube so the main one reaches about an inch off of tank floor, secondary one drains the tank. At first sputter you just reach down to the selector handle sticking through floor and start looking for a station. VW actually used a similar system into the 1960's...no gauge. As I remember the selector stuck through floor near gas pedal and could be flicked over by toe! VW did this I believe with a single hole in tank and a special selector valve with high and low holes in one stem. Can't figgerout how I'd do that with an RV/truck three hole valve...
No fuel gauge for me. I'm running a gas tank from a 1924 Federal-Knight truck. I do carry a wooden stick that has measurements for a round tank, an oval tank & a square tank. I mean, what more do you need?
I've been driving my roadster with an inoperative fuel gauge for years. Around town I dip the tank with a dowel to test for whether I need to put some more dead dinosaurs in or not. On the open road, I go by time. After two to two and a half hours, it's time to stop and refill. Since I am not as tough as I once was, I would just as soon get out and walk a little by then anyways. It has a pretty good sized tank, and I fuel plan conservatively. Oddly enough, I've run out of fuel way fewer times since the gauge quit than before.
The petcock style setup there is also popular with many motorcycles - just have two separate-depth tubes (or have the petcock move the initial tube deeper).
I drove the Plymouth for the first 12 years without all over the country. I always kept about a half gallon of gas in a can on board just in case. i did just like animal Ain described above, every couple of hours it's time to stop and stretch the nack and legs anyway might as well fill up too. i very rarely ran out.
Gauge quit working in my 53 two years after I got it on the road. I just fill it up every time and right down the mileage. When it gets between 200 and 250 miles, I fill it up again. Haven't used a gauge or stick or anything in the past 15 years and never ran out of gas.
I run without in my 28 rpu. I also use the original speedo which is fairly accurate. It also has a a mileage counter so i just lowball my mpg. Running a vega gas tank so there is only about 10 gallons so i fill up every 100 miles or so. I carry a gallon of gas in the trunk that's in the box with me to and i have used it. It's a pain in the ass basicly.
My 23 had one of those spun aluminum tanks and didn't have a sender, so no gauge. I just kept an eye on it, although I did run out of gas twice in the 3 years I owned it. My 27 has a gauge but it is as inaccurate as hell, so I just use it as a guesstimate of if I need gas or not. My Son did find a spun aluminum tank with a provision for a sender for his rpu, I think it was from some dune buggy supplier. Don
Bought a newer Buick for my wife, replaced an older one(Buick not wife). Found out the sender was wonky, she is better now watching the trip meter than she EVER was watching the fuel guage!
My missus runs out of gas even with a fuel gauge and a warning light [ so we all rely too much on these guages and still ignore them ] I bet you guys without guages have a pretty good idea of how many miles you can actually do
Haven't ever had a working gauge in my car. I have a cell in the trunk and just stop and fill up every so often. That said, i just bought a sending unit and a used original gauge to try to hook something up. Strange thing, similar to what someone else said, I have never run out of gas in the Plymouth with no gauge yet have a terrible habit of running out of gas in my cars that do have gauges...especially the ones that tell how many miles you have left...always telling myself when they read "---" that I can squeek a few more miles out of it!!!
I have driven the Jaguar..my avatar..for 38 years without a fuel gauge. I know how many miles and when to fill it.. My 53 Stude has a gauge..not very accurate..so I fill when I know I need to . I chart my miles from last fill..always
This is a direct action gauge from a Cessna Bird Dog wing tank. It's mounted in fuel tank from a Fordson tractor - now on the back of my T Model Ford Modified;
i have a 56 olds and it worked when i got it but but i had to pull the take one day and it has not worked from that day .. now i just keep it full and only let it drop down about 4 gal before i put gas back in it
I have never seen a hot rod gas gauge that works correctly! I like only three gauges tach/speedo, oil and water. I have only run out once since 73 and that was a t bucket I traded for and hadn't learned the "first rule" (Fill up when it comes out of the garage)
I've been thinking about a fuel gauge for my modified project and have remembered the gauge on a 1946 Taylorcraft BC12D that I owned in the 60's . It was a cork float on a wire sticking out f the center of the fuel cap,you could see it threw the windsheild, full tank=lots of wire showing, little wire showing ,time to refuel. .....................Jack
i ran out of gas yesterday in my galaxie. been driving that girl for 2 1/2 yrs with no gauge and i run out on the way to buy gas!!lucky i was 100 ft from the station.and i run out of gas the day before that in the driveway and its not the first time runnin out in the driveway either. my son drives my ot tahoe and he doesnt seem to understand what the E means.and its still sittin out there with no gas. ill be damned if i put another nickels worth of gas in it.the only time i run out of gas is when someone else drives the vehicle before me.on the 3rd fuel pump on the tahoe because he cant put gas in the damn thing!!!!!!!!!!!!!ive told him a hundred times the gas keeps the pump cool. no gas pump runs hot. burns up .but noooo.
I ran a gas cap gauge on my tank. It was an after-market for an 8n ford tractor. Works like an outboard motor gauge. Google it.
Moon offered a simple tube gauge on its bigger tanks, I think, in the late '60's...just two 90 degree fittings joined by a piece of clear hose on one end. Model T accessories are pretty common...how about one of the many Model T gauges that were once offered, usually a simple inked setup that lived on the radiator cap...you could modify your existing cap to take a threaded spout for T cap on top of it, and so not have to work on the tank itself.
The Jalopy Journal
