I just acquired a 2002 S60 2.4T with about 160,000 miles on it. I have run into the following problem 3 times now - car won't start until I put in about .5 - 1.0 gallon of gas.

The first time this happened the car had been sitting for a while. Upon starting it, drove down the street to gas station and put in about 12.6 gallons of gas.

The second time the car had been driven on a short trip (less than 10 minutes) and parked. After a few minutes, car would not start. Put in a small amount of gas, started fine, filled up with about 13.3 gallons of gas.

Third time I was driving down the interstate, cruise control on. Car cut off. Managed to coast across several lanes and get to the shoulder. Again - splash of gas, road a couple miles up road to gas station and filled with 12.5 gallons of gas.

In all three situations the gas gauge was reading about half full.

Any suggestions on what might be causing this? I had been leaning toward fuel pump, but after having it cut off while driving, I'm thinking something else now. Unfortunately, with having just purchased the car I'm still getting up to speed on how it all works.

TIA!

Jeff

 

sounds like a vent problem rather than a gas level. Wondering if opening the gas cap (vs adding fuel ) is what's fixing the problem. could be something in the evap system... when you say the tank was reading half full, if you refill does it take only 8-10 gallons or so or can you put in a "full tank"?

 

I can try testing the theory that it is something evap related the next time I can let it run low enough and be somewhere safe to trigger this.

The refills are only taking about 12 gallons, so it seems the gas gauge is relatively accurate.

 

Just an update - to say there is no update. With my schedule, I have not been able to find a time/place to let the car run out of gas so I could do some testing. I did run it one time down to about the 3/8 mark on the gas gauge and it was still going. Every other time I've been filling it up by around the 5/8 mark. I have one more long trip to try to make in the car this coming weekend and then the schedule should ease off so I can try to address the issue.

Only this and maybe one other item to address since buying the car.