Before you heckle me - no I’m not stupid, and under normal circumstances I usually would turn the car off. In this particular instance, however, my car battery died because I was away for 6 weeks, and there’s not enough gas for me to take it on the highway and get to where I need to go tomorrow (after I try jumping the car). Since if i turn the engine off there’s a large likelihood that the car will die and won’t turn back on again, turning the car off while I fill my tank isn’t a very viable option. Can I get away with it one time, or will I ruin my engine or blow up my car?
If it makes a difference - 2020 Land Rover discover (sport). If that’s not viable, what are my other options for charging my car up enough with only <30 miles in the tank so that I’ll be able to also refuel my car without the battery going out?
Thanks!
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It was mostly a problem for older cars but new cars and pumps have a lot more safety features
It’s fine. I stopped turning my car off to get gas years ago. For a couple of those years, I was refueling every day because I drove for work.
Next time you’re gonna be away for 6 weeks, buy a battery tender.
You drive a 2020 Land Rover and can’t afford to replace the battery, buy a battery charger, buy a booster pack, or literally anything other than leave it running?
Why are you making this so complicated
- Jump the car
- Drive to autozone/napa/o’reilly’s/advance
- Get a new battery
- Drive to gas station
- Get gas
If you don’t have enough gas to make that journey, then insert step 0: have someone bring you more gas with a jerry can
Yes. Absolutely you can
I had a buddy who’s knew where Mercedes didn’t like it when he did that. it threw some kind of code for some sensor in the gas tank
Ill-advised but probably will be fine. If I’m not mistaken, AAA can just replace your battery too
Why not pay AAA to just bring you a new battery?? That’s one of their services…
I was a full service gas jockey for many years, we never cared if the cars were left running. Hell, I had a part-time coworker, a semi-retired guy, who smoked while pumping gas, did so for over 20 years, until he finally left the job to actually retire. He would still stop by every afternoon to hang out with the regulars (very small town).
It shouldn’t be an issue just will throw an evap leak code so just gotta reset it and life is good
First off how dead is the battery? Even a 5km drive should be enough to restart a warm engine if the battery was just discharged and doesn’t have any actual problems.
Secondly while it won’t hurt the car they probably won’t authorize the pumps to start if the car is still running as it is illigal with gas. Technically it’s also illegal with diesel but it’s kind of standard operating practice with fleets because diesel is very difficult to accidentally ignite.
FYI do not do this with a boat
Why?
The hull of boats are like buckets and can collect gas fumes. any smalll gas leak can be catastrophic bc the gas doesn’t run out on the ground it’s contained in the boat and then then xplode. Jet skis too.
So the paranoia about refueling is overblown on cars but are justified in boats
My husband ONLY fills his tank while it’s running. I know it’s not “the safest” but then again he’s been doing it that way for 20+ years. So I’d say you’ll be just fine
The only time it would be an issue is if your evap system decides to check the integrity of the system at the same time you are refueling. It pulls the fuel tank down to vacuum and watches to see if the system bleeds back to atmospheric pressure. If you have the gas cap off, it cant pull vacuum and would set a large leak evap code. You could just clear the code with a code reader and move about your day. But the likelihood that it does this at the same time you are refueling would be extremely low in the first place.