A week and a half ago, I pulled into a gas station to fill up and discovered that the little door that covers the gas cap was locked and I had no way of opening it. It is supposed to unlock with the doors and if the key is out of the ignition. I was frustrated, but only until it opened at a gas station closer to our home.
Then I forgot about it.
Until last night when I tried to fill up again and the same thing happened. I got back into the car and hoped it would open at the 7-11 by our house. Still nothing. Oh well, 1/8 of a tank left. It will work in the morning, right?
Except today it wouldn't open either. When I got home from work I proceeded to seek a solution. A friend at work suggested that it was probably just a fuse, so that's where I looked first.
I finally found the fuse box under a panel, left of the steering wheel. None of the fuses were marked as "fuel door lock," so I had to get my Haynes car manual out. I sought out some kind of reference to this pesky problem and finally found it in Chapter 12: Chassis Electrical System as a part of the electrical diagram as "Fuel Tank Door Unlock Switch" and as a Motor on the grid.
Seeing as how everything else on that particular fuse works well, and the fact that the fuse was fine, it clearly was a problem with the switch or the motor.
I am not interested in spending hours on my own or hundreds of dollars at the dealership just to regain access to my gas tank. Plus, who on earth still syphons gas out of cars these days?
So, I broke in. Blaise even offered to be an accomplice by holding the flashlight.
See that little nub in the middle there, that's what I cut off with my Swiss Army Knife. (I love those knives!)
1 comment:
It all sounds like Audi has made it too complicated...similar to the too complicated when you were trying to get the code to make your cd player work....I think they are great cars...but it seems that is something that shouldn't happen....glad you figured it out though!
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