Getting gas from a modern car

garandman

garandman

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Most modern cars have an anti-siphon device in the fuel intake.

The only advice I've found about getting gas out of a car is basically to remove the electric fuel pump from the top. Is that the deal? If you were running on generator power and had more than one car, that would give you a decent addition to supplies.
 
ThePreBanMan said:
Crack the fuel line loose at the filter. Install a rubber hose that goes from fuel line into gas container. Turn key into on position. Let fuel pump fill container...
Click to expand...

This, and it's only something I would do in the most dire situation. I prefer to simply conserve fuel until I am certain that it will be readily available.
 
ThePreBanMan said:
Crack the fuel line loose at the filter. Install a rubber hose that goes from fuel line into gas container. Turn key into on position. Let fuel pump fill container...
Click to expand...

you will need to pull and jumper the fuel pump relay if the car isnt running. It will only give a prime pulse until the car is running. You can also use a fuel pressure gauge under the hood if you have one with a pressure bleed hose.
 
ThePreBanMan said:
Crack the fuel line loose at the filter. Install a rubber hose that goes from fuel line into gas container. Turn key into on position. Let fuel pump fill container...
Click to expand...

This, except, jump the fuel pump relay and/or fuel pump control module. Easier then turning the key on and off, and more efficient use of you battery.
 
Put a piece of hard pipe like 3/4 copper in the filler neck 6-10", and install siphon tube through this pipe to bypass anti siphon device. Some car manufacturers make a factory tool to do this, if there is another device lower in the tank like a rollover check valve, using stainless braided line will alow you to bypass this as well, This way will allow you to get fuel out of dead cars, I.E. no battery, pump ect....
 
my 97 silverado only has a flap that pushes in when you put the nozzle into the tank, if this is supposed to be an anti siphon device, it doesnt work. when i got my truck i didnt know it had a hole at the top of the tank, and naturally, when i filled it, it leaked. not wanting to waste the gas or leak it all over the driveway, i put a transfer pump hose in the tank and pumped it into a 5 gallon can. it almost wanted to act like a chinese finger trap when i pulled it out, but the silicon hose slid right out. i imagine any vehicle with the little flap would worst case require a screwdriver to hold the flap back while you pulled the siphon hose out.

the new f150's, (im not sure about other fords) have no gas cap and a simple two buttons on either side that are depressed by the filler nozzle to open the flap. give me some needlenose pliers or a pair of screwdrivers and that flap opens real quick as well.
 
06LemansC6 said:
Many vehicles today have a mesh strainer in the filler neck. If you push too hard you will puncture the strainer, and/or drop part of into the tank.
Click to expand...

This and some also have a flap where the filler neck goes into the tank. The easiest way is to get connected under the hood to the schrader test port and jump the relay. You can pump 5 gallons pretty quick. We have done this to pump water out of a fuel tank that had a hole in teh filler neck. Everytime it rained hard the owners truck would not start. tank had 12 gallons of water in it.
 
Some asian vehicles actually have a drain on the bottom of the tank, but 98% of passenger cars / trucks have some sort of anti-syphon device. I will tell you from experience you are not dropping a tank from any vehicle in New England without a lift and the proper tools. As far as "cracking the line" most are on top of the tank and not accessible, and need a line release tool to get the lines off of the sender. +1 for jumping the relay and hooking up to the test port ( if the car has one, and you can get to it)
 
kriz said:
Very soon after any sort of real disaster, a mountain bicycle, tires full of "slime" sealant, will be the only feasible transport.
Click to expand...

Horses will probably still work. They get pretty good mileage too.

But to the OP's question, why wouldn't I just leave the gas in the truck and drive to a station with a back up generator? If things get worse than that, I am popping a hole in my neighbors Lexus first, cause his only shot in hell of surviving a real crisis is my good graces
 
fencer said:
But to the OP's question, why wouldn't I just leave the gas in the truck and drive to a station with a back up generator? es
Click to expand...
This thread is "How to siphon gas out of a modern car not "Blah blah blah end of the world etc."

To answer your question, after running for three days on generator power my buddy woke up to find an 18" tree down across his driveway and the tree surgeons all booked up. He was able to get it cleared but would have had it rough doing it alone.
 
Last edited:
fencer said:
Horses will probably still work. They get pretty good mileage too.

But to the OP's question, why wouldn't I just leave the gas in the truck and drive to a station with a back up generator? If things get worse than that, I am popping a hole in my neighbors Lexus first, cause his only shot in hell of surviving a real crisis is my good graces
Click to expand...

That's fine as long as there are enough such stations open for an ordinary person to get gas without waiting for an entire day. In some areas gas it near totally unavailable, and as a very few stations open up, only important people are allowed to get fuel.
 
I have had wires come down all around me, and the service ripped off my house and into the driveway.

I managed to get 1 vehicle out, but not without getting into a pissing match with a local cop.

Other times I have been pinned down by wires across the road that have fenced me in while crews were summonsed.

Look at NY NJ right now, cold, wet, little fuel availability.

Plan for that or worse. I do
 
Rob Boudrie said:
That's fine as long as there are enough such stations open for an ordinary person to get gas without waiting for an entire day. In some areas gas it near totally unavailable, and as a very few stations open up, only important people are allowed to get fuel.
Click to expand...

So drive an hour or even two to get fuel.

garandman said:
This thread is "How to siphon...." not "Blah blah blah when the shtf......"

To answer your question, after running for three days on generator power my buddy woke up to find an 18" tree down across his driveway and the tree surgeons all booked up. He was able to get it cleared but would have had it rough doing it alone.
Click to expand...

City folk.... call a "tree surgeon" to remove a tree? I suppose the answer to the original question is to get the gas from the fuel pump.

Really not trying to be a dick head here, and I sincerely hope that your friend and his family are ok. When it was clear that Sandy was going to be an issue I filled both vehicles and made sure I had enough fuel to run the generator for a week. People told me I was going overboard, but I figured that the gas wouldn't go to waste. I just put half of it into my truck yesterday.

The fuel range on my truck is 600 miles + or -. So if I had to, I could travel 300 miles to get fuel. Top off my tank when I got there and still get home with half a tank. I live 1.6 miles from a highway and am sure I could get there in just about any circumstance. I'd drive to Pennsylvania to get fuel if I had to, and return with enough fuel to last a couple of weeks.

Again, I hope your buddy is ok
 
fencer said:
//City folk.... call a "tree surgeon" to remove a tree? I suppose the answer to the original question is to get the gas from the fuel pump.

Really not trying to be a dick head here, and I sincerely hope that your friend and his family are ok. When it was clear that Sandy was going to be an issue I filled both vehicles and made sure I had enough fuel to run the generator for a week. /
Click to expand...
First off, this has nothing to do with siphoning gas from a car. The answer to that seems to be "not easy."
Second, it wasn't a Sandy experience, it was last year's ice storm.
Third, he lives west of Worcester, not the city, where we have lost power twice in 14 years - for a total of two hours.
Fourth, I used "tree surgeon" because it makes me giggle, and watching some of those guys work, they really do operate with precision. He has a neighbor whose brother runs a tree crew on the Cape - not impacted by the storm. So he came through and cleared up the whole neighborhood and they all chipped in for him. Nothing like three skilled guys with big chain saws and a truck with a hydraulic arm to clean things up.
Finally, he was running low after three days when he wanted to go out, but still had fuel. You realize that if the same thing happened to you, on day eight someone else would be saying the same thing about you, right?
 


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