I had an interesting experience driving home from work in my Vanagon
last evening.  My '84 Vanagon is new to me, so new that I was still
on the first tank of gas.  I knew that I was close to empty but was
hoping that I could make it to my local gas station that I patronize.
Being prepared, I had my lawn mower gas can with me with a gallon
or two in it.  A few miles from work and about 5 from the gas station 
the van started losing power.  It would run through first gear just 
fine but when I went to second it would just putt along, like it was 
not getting enough gas.  At this point the gas gauge had moved up from 
setting at dead empty and parked itself at about midway through the 
red mark.  I was able to putt along for several hundred yards before
I found a safe side road to exit on.  The van never did die, but I suppose
it would have eventually.  I have never run out of gas in a pressurized
fuel injection vehicle, so the behavior struck me as odd.  I should note
that I routinely run out of gas (although never stranded) in my Ford pickup 
with dual gas tanks and an intermittent fuel gauge, so my expectations were 
preconditioned.  After transferring the gas from the can to the tank I was 
on my way without incident.  Stopping at my local gas station, which has 
a sloping drive, I pulled up to the first empty pump which positioned my 
van such that I would be pumping down hill, i.e. filler neck at the top of 
the slope.  I was pumping the gas pretty fast but not wide open when it 
clicked off at about 14.5 gallons.  At this point I heard the sound of a 
liquid spilling onto the ground.  Looking under the van I saw gas dripping 
off the far side of the gas tank.  The bottom of the tank was dry, as the 
gas was obviously coming from the top of the tank and running off.  I would 
guess from the size of puddle left that 8-10oz spilled over.  No gas came 
out of the filler neck.  The only other time I have filled up I was on the 
other side of the pumps so I was pumping gas up hill instead of down and
this did not happen.

Is this a common experience?

My only guess is that the gas was coming from a breather vent at the top
of the tank, but shouldn't that have some sort of a float valve to prevent
this type of thing from happening?

By the way, my first tank of mixed driving yielded 17.8 mpg.  I was hoping
to get closer to 20.

-- 
Jerry Huff		huff@dg-rtp.dg.com		(919)248-6277
Data General		Unix Software Development	 RTP, NC 27709