Trivia

I learnt something the other day which I wish I’d known about years ago and that ought to be common knowledge. How do you tell, apart from by looking of course, which side of a car the fuel filler is?

Now there’s been many times when I’ve borrowed or hired a car, or driven a new one for the first time, only to find myself heading into a filling station not knowing which side of the pump to aim for. I know that most pumps are designed for you to be able to fill from either side by stretching the hose across if necessary, but it’s still a lot more convenient and doesn’t require such precise positioning next to the pump if you know which side your filler cap is on.

It’s not something I’ve lain awake at night worrying about mind, but now that I know the secret it’s blindingly obvious and I wonder why more people aren’t aware of it. Or maybe they are – perhaps it is just me?

Next time you sit in your car, take a look at the dashboard, in particular the fuel gauge. Alongside it will be a symbol of a petrol pump. Now look and see which side on the symbol the nozzle is. Got it yet? If the nozzle on the graphic is on the right-hand side, then that’s where your filler cap can be found. Left-hand nozzle equals left-hand filler. The little arrow alongside is a bit of a giveaway as well. Simple isn’t it? So why didn’t someone tell me before?

I suppose there is a chance that buried somewhere in the depths of the owner’s manual is a reference to this salient point, but who reads them in detail?

There are exceptions apparently, as with every rule in life. The Ford Puma is one, as is the Nissan Primera and a friend of mine’s SEAT doesn’t follow this convention either, but it seems that most cars do.

Which begs the question, why isn’t it universally adopted and broadcast? It’s like which side the windscreen wiper and indicator stalks are in cars. Why can’t that be standardised? How many times have you driven a different car and turned the wipers on when you wanted to indicate left, simply because the wretched controls were a mirror image of the vehicle you were used to driving?

But leaving that aside, I wonder how many other gems of motoring trivia there are lying about waiting to be discovered by people like me who thought they knew about cars? I don’t want to turn into a geek about this, but I might just sit down and actually read the manual of my car this afternoon, just to find out what all those symbols and lights actually mean. After all, I might even learn something.