05 CTD / 9 mpg towing

[KSHall]

05 CTD / 9.95 mpg towing

Hey all, we just got back from vacation to Walt Disney World in Florida last night. First of all we had a great time, the camp ground is first rate! We had no problems and great weather. That is the good part, now the maybe the bad. We left from Huntington WV towed thru the mountians on I-77 to I-95 to Orlando. When I got home last night I figured up the mileage and here it is . 1807 miles ,181. 5 gallons of fuel, $509. 80, 9. 95 mpg = . 28 per mile! Now I did'nt let any grass grow under my feet nor did I break any land speed records. My truck is bone stock W/ 3. 73 gears and a automatic transmission. I ran 70 most of the time that I could even in the mountians. It has 20,000 miles on it too. What do you think? Would a tow box help these numbers any? Oh yeah one more thing it would peak at 30 pounds of boost then come down to 28 or so and would hit 1300 deg. on long hard pulls up the mountians or passing and merging into traffic. Also the truck is around 7000lbs, family 600 lbs, camper 7000 lbs, bikes, food and all our junk 600 or so for a grand total of around 15200 give or take a few hundred pounds. Thanks .

 

[JCrockett]

I think your math is wrong... . $509/1807mi is $0. 28/mile.

How heavy is the trailer? Just for comparison my 05 with Edge J/A on tow got 13-14MPG towing about 10,000lbs from MT to AK, ave between 60-65mph.

 

[KSHall]

Yep your right , my bad. Hey I'm still tired from my trip it was nice and warm 85 deg. and I had to come back to this 55 deg. weather and return to work. It is alot for a guy to take, in just 24 hours.

 

[KSHall]

Does your box make your truck run lower egt's than when it was stock? Do the tow boxes in general lower egt's or do you know? Are those things tracable for warrenty purposes? So many questions.

 

[BillGotthelf]

If you add a box (timing and fuel like a tst or edge) and are easy with the go pedal you can see 2+ more mpg. Another area is the transmission. A more efficient TC and a towing valve body can add another mpg. If you change out your air filter to a aftermarket system (like an AFE) you can lower your egt's by about 100 towing. Oh I don't sell any of these things just spent a fortune buying them.

 

[RBuesser]

Well I have the same question over in the Towing section, and havnt recieved much help yet. This weekend my wife had the horse trailer and I see by your weight that we weight a little more than you(four horse/w living quaters). But she averaged 70mph and only got 7. 5 first tank and 8 on the way home. I think the 06's must get bad mileage. I talked to our service rep and he thinks that we should see 13-15 towing. How does he think it will double. Today I hand checked and she got 16 hand checked in town. I sold a 04 ford that only got 10mpg, thought that was crap but I only went backwards. Help please. Juice box?

 

[KSHall]

This is only a guess but it seems to me that all of the 06 trucks that I've been around are a bit quieter than my 05, do you think that may have something to do with the mileage ? My truck gets 15. 5-16 summer, in town and 19-21 on the road depending on speed. It does a bit better 60-65 towing, I seem to "push" a bunch of air from 65 on up. I would like to change out the converter to a tighter one. When it downshifts from 4th to 3rd at highway speed it seems to rev up but not really go anywhere till the converter locks up.

 

[MHorne]

I have an 05 short bed 4*4 quad cab an i went on a drive with a flat bed trailer and got about 11 mpg driving it hard. On my way back with about 7 or 8 thousand pounds of cargo and i drove it hard back as well through mountains and still got 11 mpg. My egt's were peaking 1550 and boost was above 30 for most of my trip. I was on a break in the motor trip. But i can guarantee i was driving hard for virtually the whole way. You should be getting better than 9 regardless. I know there have been a lot guys saying something about a bad map sensor. However what is your mileage around town driving. Mine stays around 13. 8 cause i like to get on it too much. Its a hard habit to break.

 

[RBuesser]

The overhead said 17. 7mpg last night so how does it drop 10 mpg towing?

 

[lcaad1249]

This past weekend, I took two trucks and a flatbed gooseneck through some pretty bad hills in the Ozarks. The whole rig ended up being 22,500#'s and with my Juice Attitude/ EZ stack, and 315/70/17's I got right around 12 MPG. I was also running additive though.

 

[Posm]

Wind is everything. i tow a lot of different loads of varying hight and weight and I can tell you that the height and profile of a load affects mileage more than weight. i can tow my Gooseneck with a load of 14K and get better mileage than pulling a 7500 lb high profile load ( hay baler) at highway speeds. I routinely get 10MPG on the interstate while towing hay balers.

Cheer up though, I just got my best empty mileage ever. With a 3500 4x4 SRW with 4. 10 gears I got 20. 3 MPG hand calculated. That is with only 150K miles on it. As soon as you put another 120,000 or 130,000 miles on it the mileage should start to pick up a couple tenths.

 

[RustyJC]

At 70 MPH through the Texas Hill Country, 9. 5 MPG to 10 MPG is about right for our 16K GVWR, 13'2" tall 5th wheel. For comparison, with our previous 13. 5K GVWR 5th wheel, my 1996 V-10/47RE 3500 would get 6. 5 MPG over the same route.



With all the air a tall 5th wheel is pushing, if economy is the prime objective, the best thing we can all do is slow down. We'll be going to Tennessee this summer, and with fuel prices where they are, I doubt I'll be running 70 MPH.



Rusty

 

[Big MAK]

Yep... it's all about wind resistance. You'll have better mileage towing a 20,000lb flatbed then a 10,000lb fifth wheel RV.



Wind resistance whether it's mother nature (and side wind is worse then head wind! -- drag) or speed. Someone fresh out of physics tell us the forces at work as a relationship of velocity -- I'm sure it's atleast squared (exponential increase of power needed per unit speed added).



First full tank of fuel on my new '06 about 16mpg city/hwy mix.

 

[DavidBurt]

Exactly, slowing down will help alot. Your also pushing alot of air with that 5'er.

Dave

 

[MasterChief]

I just completed a trip from Pensacola, FL to Philadelphia, MS and back pulling my fifth wheel (650miles). We weighed the entire rig 21,050 prior to hitting the hwy. I averaged around 11. 5 mpg at an average speed of 65 mph. After talking with several other Ford and Chevy RVers pulling simular rigs, it appears as though I am getting about 1 to 2 mpg better than they are. My average mpg empty is around 16. I try to keep it all in perspective, I didn't buy this truck for the millage, I bought it to tow.



v/r

Mike

 

[JRMora]

I averaged around 11. 5 mpg at an average speed of 65 mph.



I try to keep it all in perspective, I didn't buy this truck for the millage, I bought it to tow.



v/r

Mike

Boy howdy, amen for that.



Running 22,000# at 70 we do 9. 5 -11. 5 mpg. Closer to 9 if it's windy or hilly, closer to 12 if it's calm and flat.



I rarely ever go faster than 70 pulling this rig. And yes, aero drag is proportional to the square of velocity, so the faster you go, the worse the drag gets.



I didn't buy my truck for mileage either, I bought it to pull and carry. That I get 16-17 empty is a big plus, but I wouldn't trade it for a 4 cylinder hybrid to get 30.



It's a truck, after all.

 

[KSHall]

You know it is a bunch better than when I had a Hemi powered 1/2 ton and the same load taking it to the beach summer before last, 5. 5 to 6. 5 mgp!