New Jersey residents are suing General Motors Corp. and five dealerships over the size of the fuel tanks on their Chevrolet Tahoe and GMC Yukon sport utility vehicles.
The class-action lawsuit, transferred from Superior Court in Bergen County to U.S. District Court this month, alleges that GM and the dealerships promised the Tahoes or Yukons with 30-gallon gas tanksbut delivered vehicles with smaller ones."We had one client who literally drained the tank and refilled it," said Marc Saperstein, an attorney for the plaintiffs. "It was only 25 gallons."
Similar lawsuits have been filed in several states, including California, New Mexico, Texas and Florida.
GM attorney Joe Lines said that a few of the tanks, which are made by an outside supplier, could be smaller than 30 gallons, but not by much.
"There may be certain circumstances where there are isolated cases of tanks holding less than 30 gallons," Lines said. "But in those cases we're not talking huge differences. We're talking 28 or 29 gallons."