I-70 W of Denver

koda55 wrote:
Keep your rpms high. This will help keep the engine cooler.

A bit late sir - come and gone!

Keep your rpms high. This will help keep the engine cooler.

Thanks everyone for their input. Since we'll be heading that way the middle of this week, we'll have to keep a eye on the weather. There's a chance of snow the middle of this week and we'd want to avoid that.

I would be remiss to not alert you to some other challenging areas.

The I-70 Grade just West of Denver up to Evergreen and El Rancho is where I've had the most near-overheating incidents. It will be a good 'test case' for how your Rig behaves on what's ahead. The descent West of that summit is more taxing than the area west of the Eisenhower Tunnel. Relatively short, but steep. Next is the Georgetown Grade. As steep as is allowed. Especially at the Georgetown Grade, you always smell [and see] Truck Brakes burning on the Eastbound Grade. From there, the climb up to the Eisenhower Tunnel is a very long, relentless slog, but is not so steep as the Silverthorne side.

After the Tunnel, you then face the slog after Frisco up Vail Pass to 10,400'. It's not 'too bad'. However, the descent down into Vail proper is miles long and more taxing IMO than the stretch West of the Eisenhower Tunnel into Silverthorne. Indeed, west of the Eisenhower Tunnel and the west descent from the Vail Pass Summit have multiple Truck Runaway Ramps, and I have seen Semis 'stuck' in the Gravel of several of them.

The State has added several long, wide, paved Chain up/Chain down areas well off to the right of I-70 Lanes. A call to the State will confirm that RVers can use those areas for the 30 minutes allowed [I think you can]. There are also several very large, hard dirt Turnouts along the way, clear down into Vail. My hope was that by refreshing the Cotrip Web Cams, you could watch the sort of RVs going through the Tunnel and see if they're towing or not; especially as our good Weather now improves and Folks hit the Road.

Dual, 'old' Tunnels that are bottlenecks just East of Idaho Springs are being enlarged in a major, long term Project. Traffic is being taken off I-70 and put onto a Frontage Road adjacent while blasting occurs. This is going to be ugly. Sitting still at altitude at 80 or 90 degrees is when I've had the most near-overheating incidents. There are also ~30 minute delays projected while Traffic is stopped on I-70 for the same reason. No practical way around it, and I'm not looking forward to being in that Summertime Parking Lot.

old guy wrote:
a DP should do the job. I know that there are some gassers out there that will not do it. My wife's cousin had to pull over and unhook to get up the hill coming from the west.

Wrong direction for this post!

I drive that Route all the time. There's 3 Lanes on the West side, so Big Rigs and large RVs simply hang out in that far right lane and gear down. It necks down to 2 Lanes right at the dual bore, 2 Lane [in each bore] Tunnel. I have seen 5th Wheel Trucks pulled over, Hood up. Summer temps can approach 90 F up there at 11,000' elevation. Cooling is seriously compromised due to: 1.) slow Air speed through the Radiator if you've had to gear way down, and 2.) Air density is ~20% less up there [as I recall from my Science-based Job]. Diesels w/o Turbo Temp and additional Gauges can suffer because you're caught by surprise. As noted above, Interstate Road Grade is 'standardized'. When I'm towing my lil 15' TT with a 6 Cylinder, the Water temp climbs right to the max in 2nd Gear. A/C must be off in my Rig. I just gear down for the descents. Easy does it...

Click on 'More Cameras' at the top right of the CO State Webpage below. Then, click on the '70' Interstate Logo just below Pettingell Peak to see Web Cams in both directions at the Eisenhower Tunnel. Follow the Cams both directions, including the West approach from Silverthorne (where there's lot of Factory Outlets BTW). On a Weather Site like Weather Underground, you can check temps in Silverthorne CO to see what you're in for on travel day. At the bottom left of the Weather Underground Webpage, you can look at historical Weather info for prior years. Averaged over several years, you can get a sense of temps during various weeks. We typically get afternoon Thunderstorms that cool things down.

Colorado Interstate Webcams

a DP should do the job. I know that there are some gassers out there that will not do it. My wife's cousin had to pull over and unhook to get up the hill coming from the west.

My opinion is that if you have never driven it before that you consider doing it during daylight hours.

We didn't disconnect.

There not a grade on a paved Hwy. in the U.S. that you can't pull a toad down.