Old Gas pumps cant handle new pricing

[MrBern]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080512/ap_on_bi_ge/old_gas_pumps

Mom-and-pop service stations are running into a problem as gasoline marches toward $4 a gallon: Thousands of old-fashioned pumps can't register more than $3.99 on their spinning mechanical dials.

The pumps, throwbacks to a bygone era on the American road, are difficult and expensive to upgrade, and replacing them is often out of the question for station owners who are still just scraping by.

 

[LizzieMaine]

This brings back memories of the late '70s, when gas went over a dollar a gallon for the first time. Our family gas station had old pumps which couldn't be set any higher than 99.9 cents per gallon, so for quite a while we had to sell gas by the *half gallon*. The attendant had to multiply the price shown on the counter by two to get the actual price of the sale. We'll likely see a repeat of this scenario.

 

[DutchIndo]

I remember walking to the gas station with a quarter and a gas can and getting a couple pennies back that was Mowing the lawn in the 60s. In High School it was 52 cents a gallon for our 8 track installed gas guzzlers. Those were the days of 10 cent candy bars and Cokes (no CRV either !) yep those were the days.

 

[Nick D]

There's a station in Mackinaw City, MI, I stopped at a couple years ago. It had been opened up and the little window that displays the total price had been crudely extended for a new dial ($000.00 instead of $00.00)