GM disappointingly small fuel tanks continue

June 22, 2020

9 hours ago, krankins said:

Does anyone know what the fuel tank size is for the 2021 Tahoe/Suburban? I did not see it in there media release.

2021 Suburban fuel tank 28 gallon vs 2020 was 31 gal

2021 Tahoe fuel tank 24 gallon vs 2020 was 26 gal

ickyoldman · June 23, 2020

These trucks are cheap and outdated....Not to mention underpowered. Chevy most of my adult life but no more for me.....Suck it Mary.......

Edited June 23, 2020 by ickyoldman

alpinecrick · June 25, 2020

On 6/14/2020 at 11:42 PM, Otherguy said:

Understand, but why would you buy a truck that doesn’t meet the requirements of your drive? If you knew the tank was small and still bought it, then

'Cause my GMT400's and 800's with 26 ga tanks will go almost as far as my brand new '74 K10 LWB with two 24 ga tanks would,, and will easily travel as far as my 76 K10 SWB with factory 400 SB with two 15 ga tanks would. My '06 Duramax will go a long ways when empty, not so much when pulling four horses though......

Short of installing a tank in the bed no fullsize truck will go as far as most of us would like.........

It's already been mentioned but initially the square body Blazers and Suburbans had a optional 40 ga tank that was a common option. When one of the gas crisis broke out the media became fixated on GM's 40 ga tanks and in the late 70's or so they dropped that option.

June 28, 2020

The point is, all the major truck players, except GM, offer larger tanks.

Colossus · July 3, 2020

Yeah? So? Go buy one of them already.

mookdoc6 · July 12, 2020

I just went St. George UT to Phoenix 110F all the way ended up in Phoenix with over 1/4 tank? Not sure that is happening with the others..nobody gets the MPG's like GM...Nobody!

Doug_Scott · August 4, 2020

On 4/5/2020 at 4:25 AM, swathdiver said:

The engineers size the tank based on the expected efficiency of the engine. Full size vehicles get a range of 400-500 miles and they size the tank based on the engine's mpgs to get there, more or less. This has been the logic of just about all the GM mid and full size vehicles I've owned since the 1980s.

The way they probably see it, 99% of the buyers will be fine with it and they see no added value to them taking up more space and volume and weight (less payload capacity) hauling around extra fuel so a handful of us can drive straight through from Florida to New York.

Its actually been the logic of more than just GM. I can remember my grandfather telling me that they put a tank in that can hold enough fuel to go 300 miles. That was back in the early 70s.

Since the 80s manufacturers have had to appease EPA's CAFE requirements. Don't know if they are still holding manufacturers to the requirement being applied to the actual vehicles sold as opposed to a simple average of the vehicles available. They used to take what GM sold, and took the CAFE results from those vehicles. So if GM sold too many vehicles that got poor mileage, and not enough vehicles that got great mileage, they may not meet the CAFE numbers.

Be thankful that they don't weigh the vehicles with the family loaded into it to figure out how that impacted the fuel mileage. We would end up all getting our body hair removed and nails trimmed to get the weight as low as possible.

46&2 · September 8, 2020

On 4/17/2020 at 12:16 AM, Like-A-Rock44 said:

Does the weight really matter... cut a little plastic off the fuel tank WTF? Extra speakers subwoofers add weight, The trailer break controller adds weight, the trailer hitch adds weight, the multi pro tailgate adds weight and it hits the trailer hitch when it goes down so really if you have the multi pro tailgate it should delete the trailer hitch, to save weight right?... The spray in bed liner adds weight. There is lots of stuff that adds weight that the aftermarket can cover and add later!! but the aftermarket cant cover the fuel tank so guess what don’t make it small. What a huge mistake and disservice to the customer shrinking the fuel tank size.

You do understand that the weight Is in the extra fuel which the tank holds which is not insignificant.

Doug_Scott · September 8, 2020

Something like 7.3 pounds a gallon, that would be a real gallon, not the little ones you have in the states.

Doug_Scott · September 8, 2020

On 6/25/2020 at 11:13 AM, alpinecrick said:

It's already been mentioned but initially the square body Blazers and Suburbans had a optional 40 ga tank that was a common option. When one of the gas crisis broke out the media became fixated on GM's 40 ga tanks and in the late 70's or so they dropped that option.

I think you will find it wasn't dropped because the media made it into a news item, that was about the time that CAFE came into being, and that 40 gallons of fuel was double the weight of the standard fuel load. It was an easy way lose some weight. That was back when Volkswagen used to advertise the Beetle had 13 pounds of paint on it, and their favorite slogan was "Volkswagens will definitely float, but they won't float indefinitely". I know, off topic, it was just one of those things that pops into your head when you think back in time.

Grumpy Bear · September 9, 2020

18 hours ago, Doug_Scott said:

I think you will find it wasn't dropped because the media made it into a news item, that was about the time that CAFE came into being, and that 40 gallons of fuel was double the weight of the standard fuel load. It was an easy way lose some weight. That was back when Volkswagen used to advertise the Beetle had 13 pounds of paint on it, and their favorite slogan was "Volkswagens will definitely float, but they won't float indefinitely". I know, off topic, it was just one of those things that pops into your head when you think back in time.

Love the time machine.

Wintersun · September 10, 2020

So the guys and gals at GM know something that those at Toyota, Ram, and Ford do not? Say that out loud and try not to laugh. For one thing in terms of truck market share GM/Chevy is way down in third place in numbers of trucks sold. If class 3 trucks are included, Ram outsells Ford.

For me the distance I can drive between fuel stops is very important. I bought a Chevy diesel 2500 as it provided 30% more range with the truck's 36 gallon fuel tank. Not only fewer fuel stops but fewer detours to get to a place with a gas station and one that sold diesel.

A truck that gets 20 mpg on the highway may only get 13 mpg when towing a trailer and 12 mpg on backcountry roads and trails. A 24 gal fuel tank provides a range of roughly 300 miles but even that does not tell the whole story. I don't make it a practice to drive until the tank is nearly empty and the red fuel warning light shows on the dash. In the backcountry I use a third of a tank to get to a destination and a third to get back and a third is in reserve to avoid any chance of running out of gas 30 miles from the nearest highway.

With my Willys jeeps I mounted a couple of jerry cans to their sides. With my Toyota pickups I replaced the factory gas tank with Titan tanks that held 50% more gas. I really don't want to attach jerry cans to the sides of my pickup and it is no longer legal to replace the fuel tank with a gas powered car or truck. So my options are to buy a truck with a diesel engine with double the operating costs or to buy a pickup from Ford, Ram, or Toyota.

I sold my 2500 diesel last month and plan to buy a gas powered 1500 class pickup. Unless GM provides the option of a larger gas tank for 2021 my next truck will be a Ram 1500.

Doug_Scott · September 12, 2020

On 9/10/2020 at 6:41 PM, Wintersun said:

So the guys and gals at GM know something that those at Toyota, Ram, and Ford do not? Say that out loud and try not to laugh. For one thing in terms of truck market share GM/Chevy is way down in third place in numbers of trucks sold. If class 3 trucks are included, Ram outsells Ford.

For me the distance I can drive between fuel stops is very important. I bought a Chevy diesel 2500 as it provided 30% more range with the truck's 36 gallon fuel tank. Not only fewer fuel stops but fewer detours to get to a place with a gas station and one that sold diesel.

A truck that gets 20 mpg on the highway may only get 13 mpg when towing a trailer and 12 mpg on backcountry roads and trails. A 24 gal fuel tank provides a range of roughly 300 miles but even that does not tell the whole story. I don't make it a practice to drive until the tank is nearly empty and the red fuel warning light shows on the dash. In the backcountry I use a third of a tank to get to a destination and a third to get back and a third is in reserve to avoid any chance of running out of gas 30 miles from the nearest highway.

With my Willys jeeps I mounted a couple of jerry cans to their sides. With my Toyota pickups I replaced the factory gas tank with Titan tanks that held 50% more gas. I really don't want to attach jerry cans to the sides of my pickup and it is no longer legal to replace the fuel tank with a gas powered car or truck. So my options are to buy a truck with a diesel engine with double the operating costs or to buy a pickup from Ford, Ram, or Toyota.

I sold my 2500 diesel last month and plan to buy a gas powered 1500 class pickup. Unless GM provides the option of a larger gas tank for 2021 my next truck will be a Ram 1500.

Trying to apply logic to how things are done in the business world is a waste of time. Why do they do something to save $5 per vehicle when they could just as easily raised the price by $10 and earn $5 more profit per vehicle? If a car company sells a quarter million vehicles per year, how hard is it to not slip a $4 rise in dealer cost on every vehicle and earn a cool million dollars more that year? I am by no means even remotely intelligent in business, I must be missing something, it just seems so easy to me. What am I not understanding? A long time ago I was told that a business can never recover the profit lost due to theft. I fell asleep while the guy explained it.

Colossus · September 13, 2020

On 9/10/2020 at 4:41 PM, Wintersun said:

For one thing in terms of truck market share GM/Chevy is way down in third place in numbers of trucks sold. If class 3 trucks are included, Ram outsells Ford.

Well duh.. have you seen the new silverado and sierra? VERY ugly.

September 16, 2020

It's funny how the same people don't give a damn about mileage "...it's a truck, dude..." and then complain about an almost not discernible amount of fuel wasted for stopping for gas.
You guys make it sound like that you're driving 2,000 mls every day w/o stopping.
I'm fu**ing grateful when I have an excuse to stop every 300-400 mls.
Could a bigger tank be useful? Probably. For a tiny amount of people.

so long
j-ten-ner

I need piss breaks.....

Sent from my SM-N975U using Tapatalk