Guess I should have looked at my gauge.  I did now.  There are only
full, what I would have called 1/2, 1/4, and perhaps 1/8.  But now I
think these must mean 3/5, 2/5, and 1/5 as someone else said earlier.
Oh, well.  On mine, the tank is empty when the second mark down is
reached (the one I now think means 2/5), but that is because the tank is
bent.  Dave Mc

On Tue, Oct 20, 2009 at 4:07 PM, Dave Mcneely wrote:

> Well, one thing I don't understanding about the " 'splainin' ," is
> that
> 3/4 gone and 1/4 left should be exactly the same thing.  Now why, why,
> why would there be a mark for 3/4 gone and a diferent one for 1/4
> left?
> Just wonderin'.
>
> Dave Mc
>
>
> On Tue, Oct 20, 2009 at 3:01 PM, David Beierl wrote:
>
>> At 02:58 PM 10/20/2009, Don Hanson wrote:
>>> The way it was 'splained to me, and this works for my 84...the first
>>> mark is 1/4 tank gone, the second is 1/2 The third is 3/4 and the
>>> top of the red zone is 1/4 tank left.  It's not "Reserve" but it's
>>> what is considered to be the end of the 'safe' fuel capacity zone
>>> from a German Engineer's point of veiw.
>>
>> The owner's manual is clear that "top of the red" means about 10
>> liters (2.64 US Gal, 2.2 Imp Gal)  remain.  If your isn't doing that
>> then either gauge is misadjusted or sender (or tank) is bad.
>>
>>> The spacing on the gauge face and the relative size of the lines has
>>> nothing to do with anything that I can see..At first, since the
>>> first line is about halfway across the dial and is twice as big as
>>> the other white marks, I just thought automatically it was
>>> 'half-full'.
>>
>> Half-full is how the gauge has behaved on both my '84 and '89.  Do
>> you really think that der Volks at VDO would put significant-looking
>> marks on the gauge for no reason?  We're more used to them putting on
>> tiny insignificant-looking marks that are intensely meaningful
>>
>>>  And I thought the last white line was quarter full, leaving the
>>> Red to mean "reserve"...but someone set me straight...
>>
>> If you consider that "quarter-full" *includes* the reserve, should
>> come out somewhere near right.
>>
>> I think your source is confused, likely by a bad gauge/sender
>> combination.
>>
>> Yrs,
>> David