Testing Magic Tank, the emergency fuel for when you run out of gas

I’ve only run out of gas once in my life. And at that point I was pulling off the highway to get gas, with an indicated 30 miles or so of range remaining on an old Cadillac’s digital fuel display. It turned out that the Caddy’s fuel gauge was off by about, oh, that much. We pushed the car to the gas station rather than do the red-can walk of shame, but that experience was traumatic enough that I’ve never come close to repeating it since. I’m a quarter-tank minimum kind of guy.

However, lots of people run out of gas every day. Whether victims of faulty gauges or poor planning, you see these sorry figures trudging along the highway in search of a gallon or two to limp them along to the next station. It’s a bummer at best, potentially dangerous at worst. Electric car drivers aren’t the only ones who can experience range anxiety.

Enter Magic Tank, a half-gallon bottle of which costs $29.90, with shipping (at the moment, it’s only available online). The idea is that you keep a jug of this mysterious liquid in your trunk in case you run out of gas, upon which point you pour it in your tank and hopefully find your way to some real pumps. The company calls the stuff a “patented non-flammable gasoline derivative” and claims that it’ll extinguish a burning match. I didn’t test that. And, caveat: the flash point is 105 degrees, so above that temperature it will burn (although it needs an ignition source, hence the "non-flammable" rating.) That relatively high flash point is why you can’t let your car cool off before you pour in the Magic Tank — you need a warm motor for the Magic Tank to perform its alchemy.

Basically, it sounds like this elixir mixes with whatever gas is left in your tank and fuel lines to form something that your motor can work with. So I decided to give it a try. For the first time in years, I ran out of gas.