Road Trips

Cubey

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Good point.

Take along a laptop, or find an app for the phone that will give you average fuel prices along the way.

May be worth it to take along a couple large gas cans, to fill up before a long stretch that has unusually high prices...

Gasbuddy has an app. Just plan your stops accordingly to fuel prices.
 

chillman88

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Good point.

Take along a laptop, or find an app for the phone that will give you average fuel prices along the way.

May be worth it to take along a couple large gas cans, to fill up before a long stretch that has unusually high prices...

I'm a little bit biased towards a 100gal transfer tank in the bed. Sure sucks filling it up though!
 

catbird7

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Last road trip was nor cal to Ak.
7000 miles
7 weeks
Average of 9 towing 6k.
Some of the best time made was in b.c. Due to no traffic and awesome road conditions. Capable of exceeding the trailer tires speee rating... Not sayin We did so there Dudley Doowright big grin.
Took 5n to get outta the prk as fast as possible, then the coastlines of Ore. And Washington.
B.c. ,youkon, into tok Ak. Back into radio free AMERICA!
FOUND IT, link to my road trip...
https://www.oilburners.net/threads/road-trip-up-ore-coast-border-crossing-into-b-c-alaska.84666/
I remember reading this one! Makes my little drive look like a trip to the supermarket.
 

catbird7

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Another 1800 Mile road trip in the old idi. Northern Maine again this time to hunt deer. Hauled the 1967 slide in camper, stayed just over one week in the north woods hunting for a whitetail. Saw numerous moose but zero deer. Single digits during the night really chewed up the propane! 8" of snow during the second night, wonderful county around Allagash! Old diesel worked great, averaged 11.75 mpg.
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Cubey

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Early June 2017 in Colorado:

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Cubey

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October 14, 2019 in the TX panhandle:

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Right now, I'm out in the desert until around late March or early April, depending on how soon it gets too hot for me.

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IDIBRONCO

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Right now, I'm out in the desert until around late March or early April, depending on how soon it gets too hot for me.
That sounds like a lot of fun to me. I've been fascinated by the deserts for as long as I can remember.
 

Cubey

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averaged 11.75 mpg.

I'd LOVE 11.75mpg that with a slide in camper that size. I get about 14.5 hwy in my F250HD (F350 SRW rear end, Sterling 10.25" full floater) with the short camper it has, but you can't fully stand up inside. No plumbing at all in it either. In fact, the bottom half is just the truck bed. It's not a true slide-in, just an RV-looking shell.

I see you have a 5spd, but it's also turbo and 4x4 (those = worse mpg?) so maybe my NA+C6+RWD would get roughly the same as a 093+M/T+4x4? Heck I'd be happy with 10-11mpg even, to be honest.

I tried pulling a 27ft travel trailer (1981, aluminum frame, 27ft box plus the tongue, so more like 30ft) and the F250 did it but OMG it was slow as all getout without turbo and the 3.55 gears. I got 10mpg with that though, so it could maybe get 11-12 with a big slide in. They are hard to find for a low price in decent condition, unless you are lucky.

I have considered getting rid of the camper it has and leaving the bed empty, and towing the cargo trailer behind it with tent camping gear. Then when traveling, maybe I can find a good cheap slide-in somewhere along the way and I'll have the empty truck bed for it. But, who knows how long it might take to find such a camper. I might be tent living for a year. (Ugh, no thanks!) Since this is my full time lifestyle, that's a risky move. If it was just me, maybe it wouldn't matter so much, but I have a dog too. I'd have to always make it to a campground before dark to set up my tent, or risk having to sleep in the truck cab in the driver's seat (which I can't hardly comfortably).

As it stands now, I often use truck stops, rest areas, Walmarts, etc along the way. Not doable without a proper hard sided camper of some kind that doesn't require setting up. Yeah they make truck bed tents, but that's not a very safe place to sleep in random parking lots, even if I have my dog in there with me that could chew someone's hand off.

Last month, I got 7.9mph on the ~1,500 mile trip out here in the motorhome with the little fiberglass enclosed trailer. Maybe I'd get better if I stuck to 55mph but I was in a minor hurry to get out west, so I did 65+ a lot once I hit the interstate in New Mexico & Arizona, lack of headwinds permitting.
 

IDIBRONCO

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Hauled the 1967 slide in camper,
That's the same year as mine is. I see that yours has the same crazy reverse sloped front end as mine does too. 11.75 MPG doesn't sound too bad. The last time I took mine anywhere, the truck was getting well below 10 MPG. Of course I was pulling a trailer full of ATVs and going into a wind that had to have been blowing a steady 30 MPH. I had to stay in 4th and run about on the governor just to attempt to hold 60 MPH. N/A sure didn't help anything either.

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IDIBRONCO

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They are hard to find for a low price in decent condition, unless you are lucky.
Boy, you're not kidding about that one. I wasn't looking very hard when I came across mine. I just got lucky that the uncle of a friend had this one and wanted to get rid of it. For $350, I sure couldn't complain. I had seen some advertised for $100-$150, that needed a complete interior rebuild. I sure am glad that I didn't pull the trigger on one of those. I would like a bigger one, but it would make it a lot harder to pull a trailer full of ATVs behind me. Mine works perfect for my wants.
 

Cubey

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That sounds like a lot of fun to me. I've been fascinated by the deserts for as long as I can remember.

I don't care for it much, nor does my dog. But it's $180 for the season at BLM LTVAs so it's a good cheap place to stay for winter. They have fresh water, dump stations, and garbage dumpsters included in that price. Hard to beat.
https://www.blm.gov/documents/arizo...ia-desert-do/public-room-frequently-requested

It's 23 miles to town, so I only go once every 2-3 weeks. I have 400W solar so I don't need to run the generator much at all. I do run the little 500W Yamaha one once in a while if it's a cloudy day or something. The 4KW Onan is still dumping gas into the oil even after I cleaned the carb and adjusted the float, just at a slower rate. I have wasted 12qts of oil messing with that, so I'm done with it for now. Might be a dirty air filter issue? Who knows. The carb is $175 to replace, air filter about $10. I'd rather buy a new cheapo $300 4000W generator than keep wasting oil (4qts each time!) and more parts money trying to fix the Onan. So yeah, I mostly use free solar power out here.
 

Cubey

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Boy, you're not kidding about that one. I wasn't looking very hard when I came across mine. I just got lucky that the uncle of a friend had this one and wanted to get rid of it. For $350, I sure couldn't complain.

I have seen CL ads in years passed for FREE ones, but I had the existing truck camper and it's not easy to remove. It takes at least 4 people, preferably 5-6. It has no jacks and has no bottom to it, so you have to be careful and just lift it up and set it down. When out on the road, I can't just get rid of it hardly unless I already for sure have something else lined up. Plus like I said, it's a shell. I have a bed frame setup bolted to the truck side rail and bed floor right now because I needed something to put a mattress on to get it up off the floor and to have storage under the bed. I also had a heavy duty plastic drawer unit (the grey one walmart sells in the hardware section) in there so I'd have to do something with that etc. So that camper it has now makes it impossible to easily change to something else. I'd have to get rid of it first so the bed can be empty and the tailgate removed.

There is this to allow you to tow a trailer with a longer slide-in, but you need an expensive Torklift SuperHitch to use it. https://www.torklift.com/rv/supertruss

So yeah, my ability to tow would dictate what camper I could get too, unless I get an expensive superhitch and supertruss setup. I'd rather just get an 8ft long one and not worry about all that. Or drop the trailer at my mom's and forget about it and go out in the truck without the camper on it and my gear just in the truck bed/back seat for bare minimum tent living until I can find a good slide-in along the way. Bu again, that's risky. I should have that back in early 2017 right after I got the truck but I decided I didn't want to risk trying to live that way. That's WHY i got the truck though, for a slide-in. But then I found it was impossible to get one easily and in a hurry. I had a rotten garbage fiberglass shell for a couple months until I found the one it has now. I gave away the fiberglass one to the seller of the one I have now, since I could only use one.

I've also considered getting an older Toyota or Honda minivan (V6) and living out of one of those but with a big dog that's not very roomy. Stick the cargo trailer behind it and it'll probably get the same MPG as the F250 with the existing camper and trailer. Those fuel efficient Toyotas and Hondas lose MPG hard when you add wind resistance. The Pontiac Vibe (Toyota Matrix/Corolla) lost about 5mpg with just a Yakima roof box and the hitch mounted cargo box. The car wasn't roomy enough for me + dog for full time living. Maybe if I had the cargo trailer I have now, it might have been doable with a tent, but it would probably get low teens mpg and put a lot of strain on that 4cyl Corolla engine. An early 2000s Taurus wagon would do better, if I wanted to get a cheap car to pull that trailer with. My mom has one and due to something that came up before I left, we had to tow it around town a few times and the car did find with it, even loaded with my tools and scooter. It's no speed demon and stopping is something you have to account for, but it did ok. Buying another vehicle means starting all over, AGAIN, and then having 3 vehicles (truck, motorhome, something else).

For now, I might as well stick with the 8mpg motorhome since it's very comfortable for full time living and it's seemingly reliable. I carry full coverage on it (it's $57/mo, including trailer loss coverage and roadside/towing for the RV+trailer). My main concern with the RV is the transmission. It's the weak point that could go any time. I did service it with a new filter and pan with a drain bolt for easier fluid changes. The old fluid didn't look too bad and the pan didn't look too horrible (I think) for metal muck. It does have that weird delay(?) issue when shifting up to 2 and 3 (never harsh) but I read that it could just be a band adjustment issue. But regardless, it's a nearly 36 year old transmission. it goes to 2nd at about 27mph and 3rd at about 35-37. Always at those points. Sometimes doesn't downshift back to 1 (goes down to 2 and stays) unless I come to a full and complete stop. (so at yields, I end up in 2nd gear at 2-3mph). Manual shifting works fully with no delay, so I don't think it's the clutches. On the plus side, it's a C6 so they are one of the cheapest transmission rebuilds. But regardless, that's the downside of a motorhome. My house has to be in the shop. It can't be dropped at an RV park like a slide in or trailer.

Well as I said, I'm gonna stick to the motorhome for a while I'm REALLY hoping to have my debts all paid off by around August 2021 along with having a small amount of savings again (I have been saying that for years now...). If the RV's trans starts to truly act up, if I'm within 1000 miles of my F250, I'd probably try to limp it back there. That drain bolt pan can make it easy to mess with the fluid via an additive for a short time then drain and put proper fluid back in, as easily as an oil change. (I've been watching a trans shop on YouTube where the guy says if you use AT additive, use half a bottle, but don't leave it in long term because it totally destroys the seals, not just swells them. Run it a few hundred miles then drain the pan and replace with fresh AT fluid)
 

Cubey

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@catbird7 11.75 sounds pretty good for having a heavy camper in the bed. i can only get 13-14 unloaded, i need to get 3:55s lol

How fast do you drive? My F250 *seems* to get better mpg at 60-65 than 55 with the little camper it has. Maybe it's an interstate vs back highway thing, dunno. It gets 13-14 easily on the highway at 60-65. I will say, it has cheap Chinese off brand all terrain tires and it lost 1mpg when I bought those in late 2017. The mismatched highway tires it had when bought it in early 2017 had a couple almost bald by around August 2017 and after about 3,000 miles, so they had to go. I decided on ATs since I did go off road a little at campgrounds and figured the extra grip was a good idea. New highway tread tires would probably restore that 1mpg loss. City is the same, used to get 11 city, now gets 10. It instantly changed with the new tires, so I know that's what it was.
 

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