Fuel Guage tanked
09-23-2018, 01:16 AM
#1
Cruising
Thread Starter
Fuel Guage tanked
Driving my newly acquired '03 C5 today with 56,000 miles, the alert sounded, and looking at instrument cluster it said "check gauges". The fuel gauge which had earlier registered three quarters full suddenly went to total empty. I'm wondering if this is one of C5's issues or if just simply , bad sending unit. Reaching out for advice and or help.
09-24-2018, 09:29 AM
#2
I've got to run high-quality brands (Sunoco, Shell, BP) with fuel detergent additives or add additive such as Regain or my sending unit does the same thing. Add some additive and fill up with one of those brands. May take another fill-up. Mine still often jumps to empty when below half a tank although after adding Sunoco fuel two previous fill-ups ran the tank down to nearly 1/4 without it jumping to empty. (I don't normally use Sunoco because it's usually quite a bit more expensive but I recently won 4 $25 Sunoco gift cards at a car show raffle.)
09-24-2018, 11:02 PM
#3
Cruising
Thread Starter
I've got to run high-quality brands (Sunoco, Shell, BP) with fuel detergent additives or add additive such as Regain or my sending unit does the same thing. Add some additive and fill up with one of those brands. May take another fill-up. Mine still often jumps to empty when below half a tank although after adding Sunoco fuel two previous fill-ups ran the tank down to nearly 1/4 without it jumping to empty. (I don't normally use Sunoco because it's usually quite a bit more expensive but I recently won 4 $25 Sunoco gift cards at a car show raffle.)
09-25-2018, 03:22 PM
#4
1st Gear
Member Since: Aug 2018
Location: Iowa
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Driving my newly acquired '03 C5 today with 56,000 miles, the alert sounded, and looking at instrument cluster it said "check gauges". The fuel gauge which had earlier registered three quarters full suddenly went to total empty. I'm wondering if this is one of C5's issues or if just simply , bad sending unit. Reaching out for advice and or help.
The C5 uses 2 gas tanks with a crossover system. If yours pulled a P1431 code, that means it's fuel level sensor 2, in the right hand tank.
It's happened to mine many times. I've used Techron before to clean the fuel system, but it never did anything for me. I'd manually clear the code to regain operation of the fuel gauge. The dealer I purchased my Corvette from wanted $2,000 to replace the unit. To heck with that noise! I had another shop that I've done business with for years, and had both fuel pumps replaced (OEM Delphi units) at the same time, since my Vette has 75K miles. $1,800.
Here is a well written article that describes how the fuel system works in the C5. modern corvette fuel system