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Pickups Pickups - Archived Discussions Cabover Campers & Camper Trailers (pickups) 
1377 messages, Last post on Nov 20, 2003 at 1:43 PM
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I'm back home and ready to take the camper out somewhere. Maybe next weekend. oltroll, it sounds pretty isolated there; only one way in and out? You've probably told us but what island is that? |
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I finally took the camper on a 550 mile trip was suprised how low the gas mileage can get. I only got 7.8 mpg during the first 220 miles with a srong head wind, steep hills and doing about 70 mph. This was with a V-6 Silverado 4x4. I would guess the combination weighed about 10,000 lbs. I had to push the truck in second gear to keep 65 mph up steep hills. 65 in second is about 4800 rpms. I got 10 mpg on return trip letting speed drop to 55 before I kicked it down. Is this gas mileage typical? Two things suprised me. One, tow/haul mode really works. Two, it does not keep the torque converter lock under wide open throttle. I think this generates heat in the transmission. Some hills were 5 miles long and I used WOT all the way. The outside temp was near 100 and A/C was on full blast. I can just imagine what the trans temp was! I emailed GM and they said this truck does not need a trans cooler and can tow 5000 lbs with no options other than auto trans. Is there a way to keep the trans locked, even under WOT? Is there a trans temp meter that can be installed without much trouble? In this combination, auto, 4x4 V-6, 3.73, tow haul mode would allow overdrive towing when speed was above 60 mph and would drop out of overdrive when speed was below 55 mph, regardless of load. Held trans in thrid most of the time to avoid shifting. There is a big gap between second and third at WOT. A five speed auto would be nice or possibly 4.10 gears, but they are not avaliable. |
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That Natural Bridge Park is an oasis in some pretty parched country. I was lucky to find it back in 1956. At that time it was family owned and I'm glad that it worked out for the county to take it over when they were ready to quit. I have stopped by several more times, a couple of times just to eat lunch there, and have always enjoyed it. This spring I developed a disk problem that wrecked our June trip in the camper to Colorado. After 8 weeks of bed rest I scraped through without surgery and now am almost back to normal. Finally got the camper out last week for a trip to southern Vermont. Canoed the Battenkill River from Arlington to the NY border despite the low water due to drought. This is a premier catch and release trout stream and lovely for paddling and cool swimming. Spent a couple of nights at Emerald Lake State Park in East Dorset, VT. I recommend this park highly. Clean, well run, and scenic. Our site was isolated and quiet. No connections. Battery held up just fine and repair on the blackwater tank is holding!. |
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| We live on Hatteras Island NC. It is about 60 miles long and maybe 2 1/2 miles wide at the widest point. Some places are only about 400 yards wide. We always make the weather channel this time of year. All the hurricanes head for us!!! The bridge is on the North end (about 5 miles long.) There is a ferry on the South end that takes about 45 minutes to reach the next Island--then another ferry (about 2 1/2 hours) to the mainland. | |
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Have you posted here before? If so I don't remember you, if not welcome. First I'd say that your truck did amazingly well if you could maintain 65mph up hills in any gear. My 89 F250 with a 5.0 V8 couldn't do that up any moderately serious freeway hill (like 4%+). What type of camper do you have and do you know how much it weighs? Your gas mileage is not surprising if you have a full size hard-side camper. As you know, the frontal area wind resistance is killer. Also, pushing the small engine hard drops the mileage down to the same or less than a larger engine would get. I get about the same mileage with my 6.0 Silverado that I did with the 5.0 Ford (~10mpg) even though I'm going faster now. I agree that tow/haul works well. I always run with it on unless I'm in town where it is a little annoying. I don't think you can do anything about the lock up issue. When more power is needed the trans just wants to raise the RPM and dropping out of lock is the first step. I assume it needs to be out of lock to shift but I don't know for sure, does anyone know if an auto trans can shift while locked? I very much disagree with the advice GM gave you. An aux transmission cooler is a great idea for your situation. Since you have to run at high RPM to get enough power, the trans is getting hotter than it would with a larger engine. My 2500 has a factory temperature guage and the highest trans temp I've ever seen was when I was holding speed up a hill in 2nd gear. I could see the gauge move as I climbed the hill. I've never seen it change so rapidly under any other condition, and my truck does have a factory aux cooler. Plus it's just good practice to have a cooler when you tow or carry a camper. The fluid temperature is the most important factor in transmission lifetime. You can add a cooler in a few hours for less than $100 which is pretty cheap insurance. You could plumb in an aftermarket gauge at the same time. All it needs is a sending unit in contact with the fluid and a 12V connection. |
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Sorry to hear about your back problem but it's great that you were able to avoid surgery. The back and the eyes are areas where the success rate for surgery would make it a last resort for me. That sounds like a nice trip. How do you get back to your truck when you canoe down a river? |
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It is a Nomad and weighs about 5000 lbs loaded. The newer engines have more power than the older ones. My V-6 has 200 hp at a low 4600 rpm and has about 210 ft/lbs torque avaliabe at just 1100 rpms! Not many V-8s did that a few years ago! What was your trans temp climbing the hill in second? Over 280? I'm not sure I agree with you that pusing a small engine is less efficinet than working a larger engine less. This goes against physics. Volumetric losses are less in the smaller engine. I will explain in detail if you would like. |
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| During my two trips over the past few weeks I traveled over 5,000 miles. I tried the T/H a few times in the mountains and found the truck seemed to do better without it. It would stay in a lower gear more and longer than with it out thus higher RPMS and less gas millage. The mountains here in NC are much steeper than any of the others we went in (5 & 6 % for several miles.) My transmission never reached 200 (maybe 180). The highest I have seen it is about 190 in 4 wheel drive in really soft sand on a very hot day for several miles. A few times coming down the mountains I shifted down to 2 to keep from having to brake as much. | |
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My transmission temperature never got very high, maybe 200 if I remember correctly. It's just that it changed noticeably from the bottom of the hill to the top. If it's anything like the engine temperature, it will hit a reasonable max and just stay. I've never seen the engine temp budge from normal under any condition. You may be correct about the engine. With fuel injection and feedback controls it may be just as efficient at WO as normal and really be a function of displacement. I don't think that was true back in the carburetor days. At 5000 lbs that is one heck of a load. Are you sure it's that heavy, even loaded? That would be way over my 2500's rating, I can't imagine what a 1/2 ton would do with such a load. The biggest Lance only comes in at around 3500 lbs. What suspension mods have you made? |
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| Sure it holds it in a lower gear, that's the point. Once the engine load is low enough for several seconds it will shift. I never use T/H without the camper, it just isn't needed. With your camper being so light for that truck you probably don't need it very often. One situation where it is helpful is climbing winding roads. It prevents an upshift every time you let up on the gas to enter a corner. That's an annoying feature of automatics. | |
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