Mopar_Mudder

Well I made it back from the first trip with the new 2003 Dually. I pulled my off road truck (pictured below) from northern Wisconsin to southern California. The off-road truck scales in at 7,200# their was about 500# worth of tools and parts in the back of it and the trailer is right around 4000#. So that is a total 11,700# being towed, the dually should be about 7,600# so the GCWV is 19,300#. The height of the truck on the trailer is about 11’-6”, so as you can imagine this thing does drag a lot of air going down the road. The dually is a 6spd HO with 4.10 gears, it is stock except I put a Jacobs exhaust brake on it, left is stuck for this first trip for break in and warranty reasons, it had 6500 miles on it when we left.

First off all previous trips were done with a 2001 ¾ ton automatic diesel with 4.10’s on a regular pull behind trailer. The GCVW of that was about 16,900# so it was 2,400# lighter and around 14” shorter so pulled less air also.

The handling of the dually with the gooseneck trailer was a huge improvement to say the least. The truck handled and steered just like it did with out the trailer, no handling change really at all. It was rock solid and straight as an arrow going down the road, even in strong cross and head winds. Oh yea the semis don’t suck you into them when you pass either. We were traveling pretty hard and running 75-80 mph most of the time when the speed limit permitted. On the way out we took the southern route down to Texas and across on I-40. The way back we went I-15 through Nevada and to Denver and across on I-80. The northern route was more mountains to say the least but we got to see a lot of different terrain this way.

As far as power goes I will say that I was a little worried at first. With just the trailer behind the truck it seemed to have all it could handle with out even a load on it. Well what I found out is that it doesn’t seen to really care what is behind it, it pulls the same as far as power goes. It did pull it very well, better then the previous 2000 truck even though it is a heavier load and higher in the air. It pulled way better against a head wind, which really hurt the 2000 truck, that surprised me considering the higher load height. I would not say that there was lots of power left to pull more but was enough to pull it for sure. Keep in mind that we were running 80 mph, drop it down to 55 and you feel you have power left over then. 80 mph is turning 2,600 rpms, 75-80 seems to be the sweet spot for hitting long hills in 6th gear and pulling them. I never even had to down shift out of 6th gear until we hit the mountains ½ way through New Mexico, the auto on the other hand was dropping out of over drive pretty often on the hills. Down shifted to 5th their weren’t many hills that you couldn’t hold 60-65mph on. The only problem is that when you got caught behind a slow semi or something going up a hill and had to back of you could really gain that speed back on the hills. Unfortunately B&D didn’t have their X-Monitor out so I don’t have and EGT or fuel pressure numbers, I was really hoping to.

The exhaust brake worked great and is worth every cent, can’t recommend it enough!!!

OK here is the fuel mileage stuff, this is where things go a little south. The 2000 always got around 8-1/2 to 9 mpg pulling this thing around, so I was looking for equal or slightly better maybe. I kept track of every fill up and all the mileages so I have exact numbers. I started from the time we left up till the last stop so the last 150 miles or so isn’t counted. Here it is: total of 4,655 miles and 603.53 gallons of fuel make the average 7.71 mpg, ya ouch I know. On a side note the computer I rest at the start and didn’t touch the whole trip had a reading of 7.8 at the end, so in my mind that is dead nuts on and is accurate even though I have heard reports of it being way off. There is one tank of fuel in here also of about 200 miles with no trailer on so the numbers are worse then they look. On the way out taking the southern route the average was 7.22 mpg. The trip on the way back taking the northern route was 7.86 mpg. Have over 11,000 miles on the truck now so I think that the mileage isn’t going to improve much with more break in, the power did seem to go up so though through out the trip. The worst tank of fuel was 6.61 heading up to Albuquerque, New Mexico. The best tank was 8.69 that was in CA pretty flat and only running about 62 mph because of the speed limit their.

Only had one real problem, that was with the elect fan clutch. About ½ way through New Mexico is started kicking on and off for short periods of time, which it has never even kicked in before. Well this seems weird but went away, then I noticed the exhaust break quit working which gets power off the fan circuit. It blew a fuse so put a new on in and it blew right away. There is a long drawn out story to this because of running into one bad dealer but any way. Drove all the way to CA with out it and it never got hot. What ended up happening is that that the wires to the fan were rubbing on something and shorted out, got a new clutch and rerouted the wires and all is fine. They had run into this problem once before, so it is something to look out for.

Other then that I may have a steering box problem but have to have the dealer look at it yet.

Bottom line I love the truck and it pulls great. I am hoping so intake, and exhaust upgrades along with a Comp will help the mileage.

spots

wow great report. Ya know slowing down will boost fuel mileage also..

Mopar_Mudder

Surprisingly it didn't help much. In CA we ran 62mph for just about a full tank and only got 8.69. When we were running 75-80 mph it was right around 7.3 that we were getting.<br><br>I figured out that if we slowed down to 65 we would gain say 1.4 mpg and that would save about 100 gallons of fuel which would be around $170 saved. BUT it would mean an extra 12 hours of driving or so, I will gladly pay the extra $170

GrandpasRam

Nice looking truck MM. How much of the trip was on blended winter fuel and how much straight #2? I have my hitch rails going in this weekend, and guages as soon as the arrive from Rod, so I should start to get some numbers to compare with you. However, my diff ratio is 3.73, so it will be interesting to compare towing mileages with others having 6sp HO's. I will have to do the 500 mile trailering break-in first, so no mileage figures will be comparable there, however, after that will be doing full highway (65 - 70 mph) to compare. My old '99 5sp got 10.5 to 11.3 with my 5er, so we'll monitor the new HO 6sp mileage closely after the break-in.

Mopar_Mudder

The only blended fuel was the first tank and maybe the second. I noticed basically no difference in the numbers from blended to straight #2 and even one tank of premium. I have all the numbers at home don't have them by me at work here. I don't think that 3.73's would make a difference in the milage really, plus by the way it was pulling I don't think I would want any higher gear. I know that the 2000 with 4.10's and the 2001 with 3.55's I have get exactly the same milage when pulling the truck around, but the 4.10's pull the load way better, they are both automatics though.

Hunter

I recently returned from about a 5,000+ mile trip total weight 20,000# with a very high wind catcher RV.<br><br>This would be with a one ton, single rear, 3.73, 6 speed.<br><br>Now the bad news, the wife has not figured the total mileage yet, so will get her on it and report back, but I would have to say it sounds much better than what MM is reporting with the 4.10<br><br>Hunter

Stamey

It has been my experience that for your long trip driving the computer will be more accurate. When driving locally, a mixture of city and highway, the computer will not compensate correctly for some reason. Just watch it with your around-town driving and see if it stays accurate.<br>Mine's a 99 though, maybe they improved it for 2003.<br><br>Chris<br><br>

Mopar_Mudder

I will check it again some time in normal driving. I do know that after the first tank of gas on that trip if was dead on. And I checked at the 1/2 point and it was on also.

Stamey

[quote author=Mopar_Mudder link=board=11;threadid=12774;start=0#122990 date=1049209360]<br>I will check it again some time in normal driving. I do know that after the first tank of gas on that trip if was dead on. And I checked at the 1/2 point and it was on also.<br>[/quote]<br><br>Please post back after a few city tanks. I'd like to know if they fixed that darn computer. I just wish I could fix mine. <br><br>Chris

parshal

I towed a 20 ft (17 ft. box size) 3600 lbs. travel trailer 1500 miles this weekend. I traveled 78 mph eastbound and 70 mph westbound both with the cruise. I got between 8.5 mpg and 12.5 mpg. I don't know how these guys are getting 14 mpg or so with trailers three times the size of mine.

Mopar_Mudder

I think they are doing alot of pushing <br><br>I too have never seen milage like that pulling in any of the 3 cummins we have had. Except for light low height loads, I take alot of the milage numbers I see with a grain of salt.

parshal

[quote author=Mopar_Mudder link=board=11;threadid=12774;start=0#128347 date=1050442578]<br>Except for light low height loads, I take alot of the milage numbers I see with a grain of salt.<br>[/quote]<br><br>That's becoming my conclusing as well.

parshal

[quote author=Gary - KJ6Q link=board=11;threadid=12774;start=0#128386 date=1050448120]<br>Shucks, if I couldn't get well over 10 mpg in the above situations, I might as well have a gasser... <br>[/quote]<br><br>EXACTLY!!!