The Truth About Indian Chief Fuel Gauge Accuracy

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Paul Van Gaans
1201 Howitt Street
Suite 27
Wendouree, VIC 3355
Australia

[RRRRefuelRideRace]

Very well explained Paul. Some bikes have just a smaller amount of reserve, some have bigger. One of the solutions is to avoid being deeply on reserve. Sure, it is not always possible. :)

[sparkyastwo]

Ahhh! That explains it. My 101 Scout (and many others) have had this complaint. Although, I can’t seem to find it in my owner’s manual. I’ll have to dig deeper.

Thanks! Keep up with the great content. (Still waiting for your battery update)

[al-b]

Good to know! Thanks for sharing Paul! 👍

[twowheelsoneleg]

I've had a Sport Chief for the last 6 months and this caught me out a couple of times. I have a habit of starting the bike on the side stand and warming up a little while I shut the garage door, put my kit on etc so my fault basically. I have the same saddle btw

[philedwards]

I never trust the fuel gauges on modern bikes and use the trip meter to tell me when it's time to fill up. Good video, by the way, hopefully Freddie watched it as well.

[philsaunder]

I’ve been caught out like this before but because I’d had the fuel tank off in the past to change to apes so I figured it out pretty quick. Upright and started immediately.

[theth]

Alright so.. youve just answered an important question here..

I experiance this on my birthday causing me to late to my own surprise party and was concerned that I ran out of fuel without any warning whatsoever, and even more when i saw fuel in there.
Now i know theres not something more serious wrong
Thankyou

[TheInterloafer]

This makes a lot of sense and I appreciate the explanation. Thank you for making the video Paul. Does anyone know if the same is true for the '25 Scouts?

[nielsmeer]

All motorcycle fuel gauges are usually inaccurate. They are only accurate when completely full and completely empty. Use a trip meter EVEN IF you have a fuel gauge on your bike. Reset the trip meter when you refill & track how many gallons you add when you next refill. Suppose you put in 3 gallons and rode 120 miles. Your MPG is 40 (120/3). If the usable fuel capacity of your tank is 5 gallons, you know you should be able to do 200 miles to absolute empty. You never want the fuel pickup sucking air, so aim to refill with at least 0.5 gallons remaining. That’d be at about 180 miles on that bike. If you record every tank, you’ll know the variation and can then use the most pessimistic MPG to give more margin.

For example, on one of my bikes the worst MPG I got was 40, but I’ve gotten as high as 48MPG. I only assume 40, so with a 4.2 gallon tank, I expect to refill no later than 150 miles on the trip meter. I’ll fill earlier if I’m in a more remote area.

[Rambiker]

I get the feeling the gauge is calibrated for 2 or 2.5 gallons of gas. I’ve never been able to pump more than 2 gallons worth of fuel even with gauge showing empty

[Thousand]

You are exactly right about having to stand her up for a low fuel start. That has happened to me a couple of times on my 22 Chief. Do you fuel up your tank with the bike on the stand or do you fuel up while sitting on the bike to keep it upright? Maybe you could do a video that compares the two procedures? I always fuel up with it on the stand and I feel like I'm not getting all the fuel in the tank that I could.

[damnice]

I grew up on a ranch with a bunch of different diesel engines & you can never let a diesel run out of fuel or the lines get air & have to be bled which is a pain in the butt even on a little side-by-side. I have an irrational fear of that same thing with gasoline engines so I always fill them back up if the tank is at or below 1/4. I also swear it's not my imagination that vehicles just run better with fuller tanks. Especially my Chief.

[Windwalker]

I have an Indian Chief Dark Horse since autumn 2023, actually already the 2024 version. I know the problem with the fuel pump. Why doesn't Polaris move the pump to the right-hand side on the new models? Or is this technical a bad idea?

[dav]

I will never understand why people will run their fuel leve so low to even have this problem. Why chance it? I can understand if your in the middle of nowhere and weren't paying attention to the guage, but i have seen and even know people that purposefully run their tank til the light comes on. I never let mine get below a 1/4 tank 1/8 at the absolute minimum.

[simongilbert]

that makes sense, but that is a bit of a poor design, and as we know - freddie is not the worlds best at knowing moving parts ha ha, once informed - no problem ;;;

[Scoutx]

I told Freddy to watch your video on quick starting as he made a disservice to Indian by saying that you had to wait a minute before starting up. Freddy's videos are interesting but I don't think that he's a very good rider.

[steven_scattergood]

The Buell had a single fuel pick up on one side and if you had it leaned right over on the opposite side the bike would splutter and want to shutdown. The Buell had extreme lean angles and it was a quirk of the bike and added to its excellent character. 🇦🇺👍