'00 F650 Funduro gas tank

All the specifications that I have read about my 2000 F650 Funduro show that it has a 4.5 gallon gas tank (17 litres). There is, evidently, a 0.5 gallon reserve reservoir to enable getting to a gas station after a lengthy procrastination. I've been tracking my mileage pretty closely in preparation for a "long" trip of about 200 miles; it's been getting between 47.5 and 50 mpg (leaning toward 47 with a full load).

Sharpening my pencil, my calculations revealed that I could theoretically travel almost 200 miles before having to switch to the reserve tank. Factoring in a 20% safety margin, that put me at 160 miles to make sure I refilled the gas tank.

Well, much to my surprise, I ran out of gas at about 152 miles. That put the main gas tank at close to only 3 gallons!

Can anyone tell me what is going on?? I topped off the tank nearly identically every fill-up.

- Is the reserve tank 1.5 gallons?
- Could gas be unused on one side of the tank because of a gas-sucking hose to the carburetor being plugged up?
- Maybe my phone's calculator is playing tricks on me?

Any suggestions or ideas are appreciated!

How much gas did you put in after the bike quit?



Another thought - a broken or plugged petcock.

drneo66 said:

How much gas did you put in after the bike quit?

Another thought - a broken or plugged petcock.

Click to expand...

I put in about 3.1 gallons after switching to the reserve tank and driving to the gas station (about 8 miles). It started easily when switching back to the main tank after the fill-up.

Good suggestion on the broken/plugged petcock -

I think I'll have to run it out of gas again to see if it stops at about 150 miles (~3 gallons). If it does, then I'd say the tank is either 3 gallons or there's something stopping part of the tank from feeding gas.

Thanks -