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Fuel Gauge Sending Unit Damage? - Rear-Ended 2009 Limited AWD


evh

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I’ll try and be brief. I have a 2009 Limited AWD with 150,000 miles on it. It has been a near perfect car. I bought it with 64,000 miles on it. I was rear-ended about 3 weeks ago. $5,000 worth of damage. I was hit square on. It shut off my fuel pump. I was able to switch it back on and drive away.

 

Right after the accident I was driving and the low fuel warning went off. A bit of surprise since I am the only one that drives the car and I keep really good track of things. I chalked it up to the excitement around the accident and filled it up. After it got fixed, the same thing happened. A surprise again in that I thought I had more gas. I looked underneath for a gas leak. Saw nothing. I smell no gas in in my garage.

 

It happened again and this time I know I had just a little less than ½ a tank. The low warning went off and it did not say I had 50 miles to go like it always did before the accident, it said I had about 32 miles left. So I filled it up and it only took 13.5 gallons. It would have normally taken 18 or 19 given what the gauge said.

So my thinking is the internal gas guage sending unit in the tank was somehow damaged. Can anyone provide it comments on how that sending unit works and it a huge jolt could damage it?

 

I have filled it up and am tracking it very closely and getting back in touch with my insurance company to see if I can get this covered.

Edited by evh
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  • 1 month later...

An update to this story. The sending gauge was not the issue. That was replaced and I still have the exact same problem described in the first thread. A bit more detail is now the gauge never registers full. It only goes up to 3/4. The low gas warning goes off with approximately 125 miles left. Oddly, it counts down correctly from 50 (as I described in the thread above). I will drive about 4 or 5 miles and it will say I have 49 miles until empty, etc. Does anyone have a better understanding on how this all works which might point to the problem? I am now thinking it could be the gauge. However, I wonder if things need to be "reset"? Disconnect the batter and reconnect. It almost seems like nothing is broken, but it is just calibrated wrong. Is there any type of activity such as this by turning the key 3 times, etc.?

 

Thoughts much appreciated.

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