We have 350l tank ..Sure helps in areas of high fuel prices !! Ok we top up !! Pays to !! But only enough to get by . So we fill at prices around 1.32. / 1.40 cpl .. We didnt fill going across the Nullarbor!!!

We have to us "a long range fuel tank" fitted to our ute, an extra 60 litres, we are tourers. 

It's not uncommon for us to do towards 10 000 kilometres of outback travel towing our caravan over a 2 month trip.

So the extra 60 litres helps us to manage our diesel touring better taking us from 400 ks to 600 ks between fill ups with ease.

If you go down this path there is a few things to consider, the fuel gauge reads "full" longer, the electronic trip metre will at first be inaccurate but as you travel further becomes more usable. 

But we are enjoying the expence of the long range tank and will do it again if we buy a car with a small fuel tank.

double dip!

 

-- Edited by Wanda on Friday 11th of June 2021 12:46:02 PM

I have a 55ltr Boab drop in fuel tank mounted in the tub of the ute that gives me just under 120ltrs total which almost doubles my range.

Is your vehicle petrol or diesel? If petrol there may be an argument for them but with diesel most vehicles, I imagine, will have a towing range of 500km or more (even more if you tow at 80 to 90kph).

They are relatively expensive to install and then, of course, there's the weight and most of us have significant trouble keeping that down without extra fuel.

I can't remember many places on my travels in Oz where filling stations were greater than 400km apart - Canning SR and the like excepted but you'll not be taking a caravan on that! :)

How about a 25L jerry can instead? If you go with the jerry can make sure its filler spout suits your vehicle.

Edit: typo

-- Edited by Mike Harding on Friday 11th of June 2021 01:02:53 PM

Had 90L main and 210L sub (300L total) in my last vehicle covered 380,000ks. Done a lot of remote travel with van in tow and the
dearest I seen was $4.30L thank goodness didnt have to refuel there.
It depends where you are going to travel and keeping within gvm & gcm. We had a payload of 680kg in vehicle to play with.
Id say the bigger sub more than paid for itself as we wouldnt have been able to get to most of the locations that we did.

Am I going to put a long range tank in my new vehicle BL***Y oath!

Darjak

There is more to consider than just saving cash on the total cost of your fuel. I doubt that I recouped the cost of the purchase price of the tank. However, the convenience of having the tank was worth much of its price. There were things like only having to fill up once every three weeks instead of weekly was a bonus to me. I have only encountered fuel stations running out of diesel once (but I was in town long enough for the refill to arrive before my intended departure.) On the other hand, I have heard it happening quite a few times and the LR tank gave me confidence that I would not be embarrassed by an out-of-fuel station.

I could keep going on with the list of advantages of having an LR tank but I will just finish by saying that there are more advantages to having the tank than penny pinching.

The amount of time I put into designing my setup, each litre I have put on the roof would be worth about $50 but it is worth every cent having extra range for remote areas.

bomurra wrote:

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Hello Mark,

I have been around Aust 3 times, from bottom of Tas to Cape York, Great Central Road Twice, Gibb River etc. Never seen the need for a LR tank.

For me, the cost of fitting same would never be recouped with fuel savings during the time I owned the vehicle. I prefer instead to carry two 20L jerry cans, these plus the standard tank currently give me 180 Litres which is plenty for most places in Aust.

LR tanks usually don't add resale value to a vehicle when time comes to sell, so you would need to be keeping your vehicle for a long period to justify its purchase. We use our vehicle pretty hard so prefer to turn them about every 5-6 years to avoid expensive repairs.

Not saying don't do it, do the math and work out how long the payback period is (in fuel savings alone), and if you can justify it go for it. 

Regards,

Bob.

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So, in your case you must have a standard tank of 140lts, most other 4x4 standard tanks are in the 80-90lt range so a completely different scenario.

You already have a long range tank albeit standard!

Ian

-- Edited by Wanda on Saturday 12th of June 2021 09:08:03 AM

Not sure what model Rodeo ? But the latter models had a larger tank !! The smaller tank we filled every day . What a pain that was ! The latter model had 20 litres more !! Seemed much much better fuel wise ?? Possibly was ? Even with the slightly larger V6 3.5 .

Back in the days before one was worried about excess weight, I put a 165L replacement tank in our MQ Patrol - bought second hand from a wrecker.

With our next Patrol, I bought a new replacement tank from a 4WD accessory place in Adelaide (installed it myself) but found a split in the sheet metal at the back of the tank - what a drama! Fortunately ARB Townsville was able to repair it & bill the other crowd.
We came very close to running out of fuel on one trip where we traveled from Winton to Innaminka. What I failed to take into consideration was a layer of sand on the top section of the Strzeleki Track. I managed to buy 50L at the Diamentina Ranger Station & had a small 11L jerry can on the camper trailer. We got into Innaminka with the fuel gauge on the LHS of the red marker on the fuel gauge! The jerry can was not used! Later we added a 20L jerry can to the Jayco camper when we changed campers.

The GU came with the 29L sub tank which covered us for most of our adventures & with the gas injection giving improved economy we didn't have to carry more fuel (when I could get gas).
Yes I'd like more than 76L in the D-Max but I guess I'll have to carry a jerry or two & blow the weight!

KevinJ wrote:

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I'm curious what fuel economy (diesel) people are getting whilst towing and at what speeds they get it? Litres per 100 kilometres.

-- Edited by KevinJ on Tuesday 15th of June 2021 12:43:58 PM

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 Hi Kevin. At 6800kg GCM I get 5.8km/l at 90kph,or 17.2 litres/100km.For us older folk,this is just over 16 mpg,and I'm happy with that.On paper,I could travel over 1000km between refills,with factory tanks. Cheers

Mike Harding wrote:

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Close to 3T caravan pulled by a Holden Trailblazer (2.8L turbo diesel) = 14.5L/100km towing - 9L/100km solo.

Edit:

Previous vehicle: 3.5L petrol Holden Jackaroo = 24L/100km towing - 14L/100km solo.

Edit again! I tow at a true (not speedo) 90kph.

Edit yet again (this is silly): typo

-- Edited by Mike Harding on Tuesday 15th of June 2021 01:03:31 PM

-- Edited by Mike Harding on Tuesday 15th of June 2021 01:05:09 PM

-- Edited by Mike Harding on Tuesday 15th of June 2021 01:07:36 PM

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 All that editing!!! you lost the plot Mike? 

Aussie Paul. 

KevinJ wrote:

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I'm curious what fuel economy (diesel) people are getting whilst towing and at what speeds they get it? Litres per 100 kilometres.

-- Edited by KevinJ on Tuesday 15th of June 2021 12:43:58 PM

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Land Rover Defender Dual Cab 2.5 liter 5 cylinder diesel weight about 6700 Kg. average fuel consumption 16 L/100 We also travel at 90 Kph.