Fuel Mileage from a Trip to FL and Back 2020 Ranger 2.3L EcoBoost
- Thread starter ctechbob
- Start date
I keep track of the fuel economy, but I don't give it much thought. It burns what it burns. I've committed to the fuel cost for the trip and don't think about it after that.
MSCH
Well-known member
I remember my older 1 ton with the gas engine got maybe 7 pulling a big trailer. and it had a 34 gallon tank.. so I was pretty much committed to stopping between 150 to 200 miles to fill it up.. which gets really old on a long trip. Still not as bad as an old shortbed truck I had with a 25 gallon tank and it got maybe 6 mpg pulling my utility trailer.. I took it on a 1600 mile trip once and I think I spent more time at the gas pump than I did driving. 
Also had an old F600 with the 370 4V engine... 50 gallon saddle tank would get you about 250 miles before you were bone dry. The old days weren't as great as people say they were.
Also had an old F600 with the 370 4V engine... 50 gallon saddle tank would get you about 250 miles before you were bone dry. The old days weren't as great as people say they were.
ctechbob
Well-known member
I track mine more out of curiosity than anything, well, other than keeping tabs on the powertrain. If my mileage all of a sudden goes in the crapper, I'm more likely to start looking for an issue.
It is my current belief, in the world of 10-speed transmissions and turbocharged direct injection, that weights and frontal area being equal, along with speed being traveled, that pretty much any truck, be it an I4/V6 or whatever, that fuel mileage for towing has pretty much hit a wall. You can't fight physics and it will take a certain amount of energy to move a load a given distance.
I usually base my fuel budget on 10mpg of premium.
Diesels will get better mileage than gas, but there is more energy in diesel fuel.
It is my current belief, in the world of 10-speed transmissions and turbocharged direct injection, that weights and frontal area being equal, along with speed being traveled, that pretty much any truck, be it an I4/V6 or whatever, that fuel mileage for towing has pretty much hit a wall. You can't fight physics and it will take a certain amount of energy to move a load a given distance.
I usually base my fuel budget on 10mpg of premium.
Diesels will get better mileage than gas, but there is more energy in diesel fuel.
The summer I graduated from high school, I drove with a friend from Shell Rock, IA to Ennis, MT pulling a heavy trencher on a heavy trailer. The truck was a 70s Chevy 1 ton with a built 454. On the way out I think we got about 4.5 MPG and about 6 on the way back. I seemed like we stopped every 90 minutes for gas. We carried about 20 gallons in cans, because there was a stretch in MT that the station were too far apart. He was killed last summer riding his motorcycle in broad daylight and hit a deer.
ctechbob
Well-known member
I've got a picture of the rig around here somewhere I'll have to scan.
Back in the late 90's I was working for Esoteric Audio (Main Brand was StreetWires) a 12v accessory company. At the time one of the 'Big 2' when it came to car audio wiring and the like (The other being Monster Cable). I was assigned to the technical/product development area of the company, but one of my other jobs was product/dealer support. Meaning I was one of the 2 people who got to drag around the boss's 38' race car hauler, usually with a show car in the back and chock full of demo products.
His tow vehicle of choice was a 1997 Chevy 454 Super Crew dually.
What
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Dog
We won't get into the fact that it was lowered (to make it look cool), but loaded up you were lucky to get 4mpg. Our trips on the interstate were spent with your foot buried in the carpet just to maintain highway speed. The cruise control didn't have enough power to keep it floored enough to maintain speed. The amount of fuel sent through those two little throttle body injectors had to be just about all they could send.
Talk about dealing with towing adversity.
Once we lost the airbags in the truck, spent the whole trip just hammering off the rear bump stops.
Lost 4 of 6 trailer brakes coming back from Louisville, KY. Talk about increased following distances. Completely ate through the front pads, down to the backing plates.
Changed enough trailer tires to last me a lifetime. (Someone decided that light truck tires would be just fine, I replaced them with proper trailer tires every time I had to buy one to replace them). After the first trip, I built a set of ramps so I didn't have to drag the jack out to do it. Sadly this was before nice cordless tools, so all of the lugnuts were done by hand.
I will say, other than power, that big 454 ran WOT all that time, and the (I Assume 4L80) transmission shifted constantly but neither one ever gave us a hint of problem.
Ahh memories.
MSCH
Well-known member
sounds like there was something wrong with that particular truck you mentioned if it plowed thru that much gas... I owned one of those. a 91 3500 dually w 7.4 TBI and the 4L 80. trans... not that I it had bragging mileage brag about but it got about 7.5 pulling heavy and a whopping 9 to 10 unloaded.. also drove a Big U haul cross country, had the 8.1 GM Gas engine and the Allison and that sucker got about 7.5 mpg which surprised me as it was a real load.. so the truck you mentioned is probably an outlier..
gearing makes a lot of difference.. highway gearing detracts from fuel economy when towing..
ctechbob
Well-known member
Yea, I wouldn't doubt it. This was way back before I paid attention to stuff like that. It probably had a 3.23 in it or something. Of course, now I can't find my big stack of pictures from the era either. They must have gotten put in a 'special place' and now I can't remember where that was.
I know the trailer wasn't light either. Triple axle, usually loaded with a car and a couple pallets of copper wire, a big display, brass terminals and connectors, etc.
I should say, more often than not that 'car' was a fullsize Dodge Ram that we estimated weighed about 10,000 pounds.
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