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Gas station etiquette

They do not try to fill bikes, some will want to run your card and hand you the nozzle, but they do not want to be responsible for messing up your stuff. My experience in the 40 years of riding down into that state.
 
I’m curious…..
What is Oregons logic for not allowing people to pump their own gas???
 
Oregon and my neighboring state New Jersey are the two states in the union where it’s illegal to pump your own gas.

Fire risk, insurance and theft are biggest reasons…

They do mostly allow you pump your own motorcycle gas. One guy who insisted he needed to pump the gas into my bike and it was late with few options. I put the Machine on then center stand - he was like, “you can just stay on the bike”…. You kidding me???!?

I don’t know anyone who has been fined but I guess you can be fined for pumping your own - or the attendant can be fined.?

Wayne, Carol & Blue
 
In OR at one time it was to provide a low paying job for HS or College kids, reserved just for them. In the last decade or so it seems to include recovering? meth addicts. One time in Portland a rather insistent attendant was pushy and I said, OK but if you get 1 drop on that xxx dollar gas tank I will talk to your boss...he gave me the nozzle.

Now, as for filling your tank while in the saddle, you really only have to witness once a guy splash his junk and the running gas drip onto his 'HAWT' CB-750F motor in the heat of July and burst into flames to know that is not the way to do it.
 
My first 2 guesses were safety (insurance) and employee / jobs protection.
(But with Oregon, ya never know)

( I wouldn’t buy self serve gas for years, for jobs, until a gas station attendant friend told me I was being a dumb a$$ and how much he hated pumping gas 😳😳😳)
 
My experience in NJ when on a motorcycle... I always get off the bike first, hand them my card, and 99.99% of time the attendant hands me the nozzle.
When in a cage, they always fill it. The cost of gas in NJ used to be lower than NY or CT.
Bottom line... No big deal and shouldn't be a reason to avoid OR or NJ.
 
Bob, I learned that lesson in the 80's when I went north to Canada and wasn't able to exchange enough USD to CND.
 
I live in OR and ride in both urban and rural areas. Here's my 2 cents:

I ride up, kill the bike, immediately put down the side stand, hop off the bike and put my card in the machine. Open the tank, fill up, put nozzle back, get on bike, ride away. 80% of the time, I'm gone before an attendant even gets over to my pump. Most of them look over at me, see me on autopilot and don't say a word to me.

15% of the time, they will come over, ask how my day/ride is going, tell me to ride safe. 5% of the time they will ask if I need help. 2% of the time they will hand me a paper towel (I assume for gas spills, not necessary most of the time but still a very nice gesture). 0.5% of the time they will tell me they need to run my card then hand me the nozzle... but in hundreds of fill ups on 8+ different motorcycles I've never had one tell me they needed to operate the nozzle themselves. I'd probably tell them I'll just go find another station unless they are the only option. I reckon it's younger kids with no experience who are just repeating what their manager told them: "Never let anyone pump their own gas, it's against the law."

FWIW, OR is very close to passing a new law that will allow stations to designate up to 50% of their pumps as 'self-service'; rural areas already have exemptions in place that allow for self-service. Motorcycles are already legally allowed to pump their own gas in OR - the rule is that the attendant hands you the nozzle and returns it but it's almost never done that way.

Story time: OR has vapor recovery 'boots' like many other states. My typical practice is to use one hand to push this boot up (which allows the nozzle to operate) and the other to pull the lever. I hold the end of the spout just inside the tank opening so there's an air gap between the spout and the fuel. So, a couple of years ago I was at a gas station I had filled up at dozens of times. I filled up the tank on my XSR700 and released the lever. It kept going. Instead of just letting go of the boot (which would immediately shut off the pump) or moving the spout fully into the fuel tank, I pulled the nozzle out, spraying a little gas on the tank and a bit more on the ground. But no, instead I looked like an idiot who had no idea how to operate a gas pump.

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I inspected the nozzle and the damned spring that holds the trigger lock/clip in place was missing, so the lock had unintentionally fallen into place. I told the attendant and he barely feigned interest. I didn't go back to that station until they tore it down to replace the tanks, now it has brand new pumps and they are quite nice.

I imagine most of you will have zero issues in the area we'll be riding, it's all fairly rural and you should plan to just roll up and pump your own as if you were in one of the other 48 sane states.
 
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