I have a 1995 F-150 and it ran out of gas while gauge read 3/8 tank. It's never done this before and out of the blue left me stranded out in the country. I caught all kinds of should of bought a Chevy nonsense jokes.lol. Anyhow what are the possible reasons for this happening? Actually i added a gallon and truck started and ran fine but when i topped it off it only took about ten gallons so there was actually 3/8 of a tank. truck has run fine since but it's probably going to happen again. All suggestions are welcome. Thanks everyone.

 

Float must have gotten stuck or the arm got bent somehow.

 

Do you have dual tanks?

Keep a couple gallons in the rear tank.

 

Search for "cone of failure". The cone is the strainer on the bottom of the fuel pickup in the tank, and breaks off letting it suck air around 1/4 tank...

 

If the tank wasn't empty then technically it didn't run out of gas.. maybe the pump stopped working temporarally or maybe you have some other problem. Could you hear the pump prime when you were trying to restart it after the stall? Is so then fuel supply wasn't your problem, but the ignition modules on these trucks have a known heat failure problem and go back to working again if allowed to cool down.

 

Yeah we could hear the fuel pump priming durìng sttall however what are the chances of the truck starting right after we added fuel? It had been about 30-40 minutes since the truck had been turned off but about two miles before i parked and shut off truck i lost power in foutth gearand gradually slowed down. when i dropped it into secnd i regained power and didn't notice anything elce until trying to restart truck.

 

That is enough time for things to cool off significantly especially this time of year, but it's not proof of one problem or the other. I suggest you get a fuel pressure gauge and test your truck, it should generate and hold about 40psi(V8 engines) within a few primes of the pump engine not started and upwards of 60psi for the I6, and engine running pressure should be 10-15psi lower and always increase towards the higher limits when the engine is under load. If your truck doesn't reach the higher numbers or pressure falls when the engine is loaded the pumps are on the way out.... or you have a badly clogged fuel filter.