#252: Forecourt trunk

Half the spaces at petrol stations go unused these days because people will only fill up using a nozzle which lies on the same side of the vehicle as its filler cap.

People will rarely walk around and put the nozzle in a filler tube on the ‘far’ side of the car because this requires them to park in exactly the right place (given the short length of existing hoses) and then to stretch a filthy, heavy-duty hose across their shiny paintwork.

Today’s invention is to supply petrol pumps with a simple hose extension which is attached to the existing nozzle with a jubilee clip. This still allows use of the existing trigger but enables the extension to easily reach to a filler cap on either side of any car.

The extension tube needn’t be particularly high-specification, since the pressure is restrained by the hosework already in place. It just needs to be fitted with some ‘fronds’ (made by eg attaching a small forest of long cable ties to it) which will support the hose and avoid any danger of scratching the paint.

This would significantly improve the utilisation of spaces and reduce queueing at the pumps.