Pickup caps and wind resistence.
I was wondering if you might get better gas mileage when towing a travel trailer when you have a cab high of higher cap. I have a hard flat cover now. Has anyone had any info? or comments.
Forum Discussion
- You will gets lots of opinions... including mine. Yes a shell will improve air flow and to a small degree mileage. The best reason to have one is the secure storage it provides. Drove F-150 S Cab's (2), for 15 years both with a shell. Unless you are going go the fiver route no reason not to have one. If you decide to add a wind deflector, and yes they work, having the shell enables you to mount it closer to the TT which dramatically improves its performance. We got an additional 1.5 to 2 mpg averaging 12.5 at 60. :C
- I don't think you would notice mch difference by adding a cab high cap,instead of the cover you have now. It would add a little more weight, that would nearly offset the extra wind deflection.
I have noticed that I rarely drive straight into a head wind. It seems to always be from the front/side, which catches the TV front, plus most of the trailer front.
I pull a 7-23 enclosed trailer, with a v-nose in the winter. It handles the wind quite well!
Jerry - Wind tunnel tests show the air flying over the bed anyway so a cap doesn't help.
On the other hand, there is one very useful place for a pickup truck bed cap: One can run their generator in one that is well ventilated (the side windows open or at least have openable vents) and it is out of sight/out of mind for thieves. - As stated there are a lot of reasons to have a cap, but spending $1,500 to save $100 on fuel is the least of them. I have mine outfitted for a night or two of camping. Not towing the trailer really saves some gasoline.
- It might have a very slight difference but not even close enough to justify buying one for that reason alone. We got ours to gain covered storage space.
- I have used both ways, with a cap for years and other years with out the cap. No difference at all but I like the cap as I can store "stuff" out of sight, locked up. Plus I keep my EU3000 Honda in the bed and do not have to take it out
when I run it - I've had them on two different trucks and they made no difference in mileage either towing or solo.
- I've read on other sites that the best thing you can do to improve you mileage is not so much in the front but, more so in the back. As you pull a big square box down the road the wind going over it creates a big suction behind it that drags you backwards. There are different company's out there selling different types of things that are suppose to break up the flow of wind and the big suction at the back. It kinda makes since if you think about it. Look at todays ugly cars. They are quite often rounded on both ends. But, I don't know if any of those add on things for your trailer really work or not.
