28,500 lbs Ford vs Ram 1 ton DRW
VIDEO $80,115 MSRP Ram 3500 385hp/930tq, 4.10 rear, 5690# payload as configured, 11 brake applications on the way down. 2.7 mpg and 11 min 41 sec on the uphill portion. $83,015 MSRP Ford F350...
Forum Discussion
4x4ord wrote:Cummins12V98 wrote:Me Again wrote:
Let experienced drivers manual select the gears both going up and back down. Then you will learn a lot more about each truck. Number of brake applications down hills should be greatly reduced.
Agreed! I can tell you my last RAM 11 HO Dually towing a combined 29K with 3.42's I could manually drop a gear at times and get it to gain some speed while on a grade. The AISIN knows exactly where to be as I have tried dropping a gear on grade and it did not make one bit of difference in speed.
Only thing I may do is if I know I will be dropping a gear on grade is to do it just before my speed starts to drop. I mostly tow with cruise on up and down grades and on the flats.
When descending I choose the gear I would have came up the grade in. I set cruise for the speed I want to descend but most of the time I am set to a few mph slower than I want to maintain. I rarely touch my service brakes even when double towing at 35K combined.
Bottom line you can make these trucks perform best with a little help from the educated driver!!!
I'm not certain but I kind of think the Ford applies the brakes when using cruise and going down hill. Hopefully I'm wrong and it is just the exhaust brake that is applied. The reason I think it is the wheel brakes is that at night I can see the glow of the brake lights in the side mirror come on when I go down a steep hill on cruise. I've never noticed that when manually using the exhaust brake.
I hope you are wrong also, having the vehicle automagically apply the service brakes is not something one would want. The whole purpose of an exhaust brake to to save nice cool service brakes for when they are really needed. That is why I descend mountain passes at a speed/gear that allows the exhaust brake to do the majority of the speed control.
Maybe Ford's have logic that lights the brake lights when the exhaust brake engages? Was "adaptive cruise control" in play here?
As a kid we had a friends father that was on "What's my Line?" He had a patent on a three light rear indicator. Green was on when the throttle was in use, orange while coasting, and red when the brakes were on. Some transit buses now have a version of this.
When caravaning I always warn others that my rig slows down on the exhaust brake without lighting the brake lights!
