Ecodiesel towing test. Suspension sag, mpg, power, and cooling

[DonFitzwater]

That's talking out of both corners of your mouth! Air Bags are bad/Kelderman air ride is good? Chris

Firestone ride rite airbags are garbage. Kelderman air ride systems are a different beast. Hardly a "both corners of your mouth" comparison.

 

[AH64ID]

Firestone ride rite airbags are garbage. Kelderman air ride systems are a different beast. Hardly a "both corners of your mouth" comparison.

Again, your experiences are the opposite of most. Far more Timbren complaints than air bags, but then again far more people in the lower 48. Cold winters are very hard on things, but in -20's down here I have never had a leak, bag or line failure, or any other issue. I have over 90K miles on my bags (6 years old), and not a single issue. Many of those miles are on some of the roughest roads I have ever driven, to include Alaska roads. My dad has 275K miles on a set (17 years old) , 115K (8 years old) on another set, and about 70K on a 3rd set (7 years old, Toyota Tacoma that I originally owned and wheeled where the bags and shocks limited travel together, so stressed bags) and his only issue was a Schrader valve failure which can't be traced back to the airbags themselves, on his oldest set about 3 years ago. He also drives on some very rough roads and has had all 3 rigs in the -30's without leaks.

Just pointing out that your experience isn't in conjunction with the norm, kinda like a high mileage stock 6.0.

It hard to support a product that is generally known as the "oops, should have done airbags like everyone said" product. I have seen it on multiple vehicle platforms, and nearly always the end result is a removed product.

I'm glad they work for you, but calling a more proven product garbage is a little much...

 

[CFollett]

Just wondering ? If a new hole is drilled in the hitch either to lengthen or shorten the pin point how much would it weaken the 2 "X 2" bar ? Would 2" be enough to not be a concern ? I always thought removing material weaken it ? For the record I have had both Bags and Timbrens, Bags every time !

 

[RangerGress]

Just wondering ? If a new hole is drilled in the hitch either to lengthen or shorten the pin point how much would it weaken the 2 "X 2" bar ? Would 2" be enough to not be a concern ? I always thought removing material weaken it ? For the record I have had both Bags and Timbrens, Bags every time !

All else being equal, shortening the shank can't make it weaker. Reducing the length of the shank makes it stronger because it shortens the lever arm so reduced "moment." Shear forces remain unchanged.

Of course, a person can always find a way to screw things up. A person could drill a hole that is too big, for example.

 

[AH64ID]

All else being equal, shortening the shank can't make it weaker. Reducing the length of the shank makes it stronger because it shortens the lever arm so reduced "moment." Shear forces remain unchanged.

Of course, a person can always find a way to screw things up. A person could drill a hole that is too big, for example.

It could be weaker in the sense that the area where the pin force is place during acceleration, and any constant speed, is now possibly smaller than originally. But 2" should be plenty, thou I do t think any of the 2 hole shanks have holes that close..but I could be wrong.

 

[lawdog1]

I have a suggestion about engine temperature reduction...Redline Water Wetter. It comes in a small bottle you add it to your coolant in the radiator and I have run it in several engines and in my experience it will run you 20/25 degrees cooler. It changes the adhesion properties of the water/coolant and reduces the micro air bubbles that form on metal surfaces in the cooling system (thus giving you better water/coolant on metal contact and better heat transfer from the engine to the coolant resulting in lower engine operating and coolant temperatures.) ...you may say how does that lower your coolant temperature??, sounds like you are getting more heat in the coolant??...you are getting more heat in the coolant thus cooling the engine better, but it also removes the micro air bubbles from the radiator as well so the heat can dissipate more efficiently there. It works and I recommend it (....and no I don't sell it or endorse it for money. ) All that being said I cannot speak to whether it is compatible with the coolant used in the new Ecodiesel so please check that out before adding a bottle, maybe call Redline and ask.

 

[JR]

How can it make an engine run cooler? As long as the stat is operating properly it will remain closed until the desired temperature.

 

[lawdog1]

How can it make an engine run cooler? As long as the stat is operating properly it will remain closed until the desired temperature.

If it runs cooler the stat may not open as often/soon, but the stat will still open at the same temperature with or without the water wetter. If you took Engine A with no water wetter, and Engine B with water wetter, and put both identical engines under the same load, and same conditions, the engine with the Water Wetter would run cooler in my experience. On my Jeep I can run it slow in the woods all day in the summer and never get over a 1/3rd on the temp gauge, pre-Water Wetter I was always at a 1/2, sometime more. So enables the engine to cool more efficiently for the reason I previously indicated. I am not a chemist or physicist but that is my layman explanation of how it works and why.

 

[RangerGress]

I am very familiar with Waterwetter because it's commonly used in race cars.

In the early months with my Ecodiesel I was worked up about coolant temps, but I'm over that. For a while I was considering reducing the fraction of anti-freeze from the normal 50% to ~25%, and adding some Waterwetter. Antifreeze is not as good a heat exchange medium as water so by reducing the fraction of anti-freeze I'd have a more capable cooling system. Here on the GA coast the temp rarely dips below freezing so 25% anti-freeze would be more that adequate proteciton. But as I learned more about the engine and towed many miles, my concerns kinda went away. Mostly one just has to get used to higher engine temps. The temp gauge doesn't even get to "center" until ~224deg. Probably buried in this thread somewhere was the discovery that apparently the tstat doesn't even fully open until 228deg.

I don't remember what the max temp I've seen over the summer. I played around with it a lot watching all fluid temps and also EGTs. A lot of those notes should be in this thread. Max coolant temp was maybe 234deg? So to bring the temp back down I just slowed down a bit. Hypothetically, If I was pulling up a mountain and the temp started climbing, I'd just slow down a bit. I don't mind backing off the accelerator to go easy on the engine.

If I lived in the desert or had to tow up mountains, maybe I'd relook the need to help out the coolant system a bit.

I have a long history of regrettable car/truck purchases. No one is more surprised than I at how well this truck is working out. I like it so much it's become my daily driver.

 

[Ozymandias]

234° ist still fine and within the specification for this Engine.

You all shouldn't forget it is a European Engine, you can't compare it to anything you have known in the past.

Those engines run far hotter then any before because of the emission standards.

 

[ARARAR]

Hitch set-up

Looking at your pictures your hitch setup is wrong. You need to tilt the head back more, the bars shouldn't be against the trailer frame like that. The bars need to be under the frame rails. Just my 2 cents.

From my towing experience the bars should be tensioned to be below the trailer frame and pretty much parallel to the trailer frame. This requires some adjustments til you get it right and with the proper tension. You might look into a Pullrite trailer hitch that fits under your truck. I had one on my '98.5 and could hardly tell that there was anything back there. My trailer at that time had a 900# tongue weight and pushed me around quite a bit with just a standard weight distributing hitch.

 

[crispyboy]

Sadly I don't think the Pullrite weight distributing hitch is made any more.
If your pulling a tall hard sided utility or travel trailer you may want to look at the Propride 3P or Hensley Arrow hitch. They are expensive but they work as advertised.
Other hitches can do the job too but the Propride and Hensley are top shelf because of the way they operate.

 

[ARARAR]

You might look into it. There are made for specific model trucks, it's not a one fits all. The one I recently took off my truck (because I only tow a Tracker Bass bout these days) was the heavy duty one that mounts under the truck and has a 70 deg turn radius to either side cost me $1600 back then. If there's a camping world close by they should be able to tell you. I did the install and mods to trailer wiring myself Those other hitches don't compare they're just a heavier version of your standard receiver.

 

[WalterJ]

Your anti-freeze guessing is incorrect.

50% glycol is optimal to take best advantage of the coolants' "specific heat". Reducing this % will not absorb nor transfer as many BTU's. "Red Line #80204 Water Wetter" can help a little more.

They run 60% in Alaska for minimum freezing point, but that's the only other modification to the glycol % in "normal" use.

 

[RangerGress]

Your anti-freeze guessing is incorrect.

50% glycol is optimal to take best advantage of the coolants' "specific heat". Reducing this % will not absorb nor transfer as many BTU's. "Red Line #80204 Water Wetter" can help a little more.

They run 60% in Alaska for minimum freezing point, but that's the only other modification to the glycol % in "normal" use.

I stand behind my guessing.

http://www.hotrod.com/how-to/engine/1307-glycol-or-water-coolant/

http://homepage.usask.ca/~llr130/physics/HeatCapcityOfAntiFreeze.html

 

[AH64ID]

100% water does have the best heat transfer rate; however, dropping blow about 44% coolant will cause corrosion issues.

 

[RangerGress]

No big deal. If someone was all excited about adding a little cooling capacity they should use a wetting agent. Those usually have anti-corrosives in them.

This is all OBE (overcome by events) tho. This is an old thread. What was really going on with coolant temp is that the engine just runs hotter than we're used to. I've been towing with the EcoD for almost 3yrs now and it's done fabulously. Rumor is that the thermostat isn't fully open until 228deg. The coolant gauge doesn't even get up to center until 224-225deg. The only time the temp has gone into the 230's is when I increased towing a fair amount faster, say 75mph, then I usually tow (63mph) just to see the impact on mpg. I've read that others have put the truck into a mode where the HVAC starts pushing hot air by pulling hard up mountain passes. That happened at 245ish. I don't recall what happened if the temp got hotter.

It's an efficient little 240hp engine. It's not a good fit for pulling a big load up over a mountain pass. Everything has compromises.