Chips, power, and fuel mileage

[jacksy3]

My buddy has an 05 Duramax. He started with 13 mpg when he bought the truck brand new, now he has over 60k miles on it and he avgs 18 MPG city and Hwy. We live Seattle with lots of hills. When he heads to his property over 2 mt passes he gets about 22 mpg. Towing his bobcat in a 5000lb dump trailer he still gets 17 mpg. Chevy might be worth looking at.
With my Ford in the shop for over 10 days now I am starting to wish I bought a Duramax.

 

[FordGuy100]

I know what you are saying but explain this.......

Last leg of trip from Shelby, MT to Goshen, IN, Same performance tune, nothing changed. 1030.4 miles.... 99% Interstate, drove as conservativly as I could.. taking off slow etc... 62- 63 mph the whole way on #2 winterized diesel... NOT BLENDED.

66.026 Gallons, $257.44

15.6 MPG ... *** happened.

I'm so pissed I could light this truck on fire and walk away with no remorse!!!!!!!!!

Whole trip start to finish.... 1/2 pulling a 30' fifth wheel and 1/2 empty coming back.

3415 Miles
250.387 Gallons of fuel
$994.70 for fuel

13.64 MPG avg

Looking at several different Dodges this week while I'm home. Each will be test driven 150 - 200 miles to check fuel economy before I buy. Truck has vey been dependable but that only goes so far when I'm handing my dinner money to BIG OIL!!!!!!!!!! Something's gotta change.

Sorry Ford, after 22 years and 6 good trucks I gotta look elsewhere and it ain't gonna be a 6.4 after personally talking to several very unhappy owners.

Rip off the muffler and cat, and do some sort of intake. That'll help out a lot. Give it that one last chance my friend.

 

[tonkadoctor]

Head winds? Hills? I can tell you that running empty with my truck on a long haul will get me in the high 19's and low 20's depending on speed.

I was averaging 15.8 when the truck was my daily and that was probably 60% city and 40% highway miles.

I did have head wind going up to Alberta and a 30' 9000+ lb (shipping weight) mid level luxury fifth wheel so I'm not too disapointed with the loaded mileage... It's the empty mileage on the interstate with a tail wind I'm really stoked about.

My buddy has an 05 Duramax. He started with 13 mpg when he bought the truck brand new, now he has over 60k miles on it and he avgs 18 MPG city and Hwy. We live Seattle with lots of hills. When he heads to his property over 2 mt passes he gets about 22 mpg. Towing his bobcat in a 5000lb dump trailer he still gets 17 mpg. Chevy might be worth looking at.
With my Ford in the shop for over 10 days now I am starting to wish I bought a Duramax.

Giving GM some consideration but I had waaaaaaaaay to many problems with chebby years ago, pretty leary of them now. My brother won't buy a GM product any more because of recent problems with his Denali, his Yukon and my Dads suburban.

I personally never liked the interiors in GM cars either. I had great luck with my 93 Plymouth sundance duster V-6 that I finally sold a couple years ago, great fuel economy and extreemly dependable, no problems at all until the tranny went at about 130k

Rip off the muffler and cat, and do some sort of intake. That'll help out a lot. Give it that one last chance my friend.

Nope, She's history, cleaning it out and cleaning it up already. I feel like I'd just be throwing good money after bad which is a poor business decision. Putting as many miles on a truck as I am I have to act now. Can't stall on a business decision as it will bury you, been there done that and ain't gonna have the same thing run me out of business a 3rd time..... Happened twice before with big trucks.

Already have 125k on the truck and KBB trade in value in good condition in is right about what I owe which is $21k.

If anyone wants a good dependable truck with a clean CARFAX, new batteries, new tires and doesn't care about fuel economy....... $21k and it's yours, speak now or forever hold your peace, going shopping Monday or Tuesday.

I have other reasons for leaving Ford too.

1. BAD price gouging in the Parts and service dept
2. $100 fuel filters
3. Pricing themselves out of reach of the people that made their trucks great..... The American Middle class working man.
4. Forgetting a truck has to not only be dependable, but affordable.
5. Forgetting that a diesel owner spends the extra 6 grand for a diesel powered truck not only for the power and dependability..... but the long term fuel savings too
6. and it's gonna be even worse with 6.4 parts, EPA etc....

Sorry buddy, 6 Ford trucks over a 22 year span and they finally managed to lose me.

 

[tgatch]

Fuel filters are cheap at International... $38. But I do agree that Ford is REALLY proud of those filters.

They are ALL not getting the mileage they once were. 350HP comes at the cost of more fuel. Simple physics. EPA isn't helping matters either.

As far as price goes.....

I just did a build your own on all 3 4x4 Dually Crew cabs with 8' bed (Quad for the dodge). I equipped them all as close as possible

Ford $50,335
Chevy $46,665
Dodge $49,800

Those are MSRP's without incentives. So NONE of them are cheap.

 

[tonkadoctor]

I know none of them are cheap. Prolly will never buy another new truck. Going to look at a 2004 1 owner clean carfax Dodge SLT quad cab 2wd 6 speed 3.73 ratio dually w/ 87k. They are asking $18k which is KBB private party good condition price.

Have found a few other 6 speeds within 300 miles of the house too including a nice Ram 2500 Laramie w/ 33k for $21k which is also in line with KBB private party value.

 

[FordGuy100]

I know none of them are cheap. Prolly will never buy another new truck. Going to look at a 2004 1 owner clean carfax Dodge SLT quad cab 2wd 6 speed 3.73 ratio dually w/ 87k. They are asking $18k which is KBB private party good condition price.

Have found a few other 6 speeds within 300 miles of the house too including a nice Ram 2500 Laramie w/ 33k for $21k which is also in line with KBB private party value.

Are you sure you want a 2wd if your going to be hauling things into Canada and what not, in the winter? I suppose it'll net you some better fuel economy, and you could always chain up.

To be honest with you, I would kill for a CR cummins .

 

[tonkadoctor]

Are you sure you want a 2wd if your going to be hauling things into Canada and what not, in the winter? I suppose it'll net you some better fuel economy, and you could always chain up.

To be honest with you, I would kill for a CR cummins .

2wd isn't a problem in Canada in the winter... They know how to keep their roads clean, if it ain't clear wait 15 minutes for the salt shaker to go by. IMHO they do a pretty good job up in AB and SK where I like to run .

Can't hang iron pulling TT, it'll destroy them. May get a set of cable chains just for emergencies.

Only time I actually "needed" 4x4 was climbing the grade coming off the ice bridge going into La Crete and in a few un plowed dealers lots where I was just doing them a favor putting the trailer out of their way into a better area for them. These situations can be avoided and overcome without 4x4. Would consider an ARB air locker to accomplish the same low traction situations.

I love a Ford truck but I have to make a change for the buisiness I'm doing. Just a 1 MPG increase in fuel economy is over $100 a week proffit..... Wanna do the math for a 1 - 2 MPG loaded increase and 4 - 5 mpg empty increase..... It'll make the truck payments and give me change back