Tow vehicle fuel tank size

mileshuff wrote:
My 2007 Dodge short bed has a 34 gallon (128L) which is all I need. My legs and bladder need a stop every few hours!

But I like the option to just drain my tank and keep on going to find cheaper fuel or a more convenient place to fuel.

I'll be adding a 40 gallon axillary tank to the truck this winter.

Ken

My 2007 Dodge short bed has a 34 gallon (128L) which is all I need. My legs and bladder need a stop every few hours!

X2 and add that it is very much like 'safety margin' in my book

Sub is a GMT400, so 42 US gallons. Also carry 5 US Gallon Jerry cans
when going to remote areas.

Have had a a bad tank on a trip to DisneyLand. Changed out the fuel
filter the day before the trip. A week later back home...the next day
leaving work had the Sub die. Towed home and took out the fuel filter
to find it about 2x in weight. Took it to work and had the guys in
the lab cut it open and take a mass spec. Rust (iron), dirt and more
rust. Guessing one of the stations along Highway 5 didn't have it's
filters in or bypassed.

This also killed my fuel pump and had to drop that 42 gallon tank that
had just been filled.

I like...LOVE margin of any kind ! :B

fj12ryder wrote:
The nice thing about carrying plenty of fuel is that you can choose where you want to stop.

You can pick a nice quiet rest stop, or visitors center and have a nice lunch.

You can pick a noisy, stinky, crowded, smelling of diesel fuel truck stop/gas station.

Pretty easy choice IMO.

Getting out to rest or stretch your legs is not the same as needing to find a fuel station that is easy to access with 50+ foot of vehicles. There are lots of convenient rest areas, parks, even big shopping center parking lots. Higher range provides more flexibility and options. You don't always need to exercise them, but they can valuable options.

Dog Folks wrote:
450 miles of range with 35 gallon tank, in the rig show below..

It depends on how far you want to drive in a day.

We only drive 150-200 miles (1/2 tank) and refuel when we are unhooked for the night.

Saves having to maneuver the 53 foot long rig in fuel stations.

Others will have different opinions, of course, but this is what works for us.

Like you I don't like to maneuver my rig in and out of gas stations. I fuel up after I unhook. So I only drive 200 miles but the fuel price at that location may be 25 cents higher than 200 more miles down the road. My OEM tank is 38 gal and I have a 50 gal aux tank in the bed of the truck. I can use GasBuddys and search our cheaper fuel be it 200 plus mile down the road

With my short bed Ford, I had just under 30 gallons of diesel. Typically we would stop every 250 miles to refuel and always had plenty left in the tank to not be forced to stop where we did not want to. My replacement truck carries over 50 gallons but I haven't driven it under load to get an accurate range yet.

Typically we don't drive more than 500 miles per day so the Ford required two fill ups per day. This was never an issue on those long 10-hour days but it would have been nice to able to do 400 miles comfortably without having to stop for fuel or worry about coasting in on vapor and sucking up garbage off the bottom of the tank.

The nice thing about carrying plenty of fuel is that you can choose where you want to stop.

You can pick a nice quiet rest stop, or visitors center and have a nice lunch.

You can pick a noisy, stinky, crowded, smelling of diesel fuel truck stop/gas station.

Pretty easy choice IMO.

Our F350 came with the smaller fuel tank. When not towing, which is seldom, I still have over a 400 miles range. When towing a fiver that is close to 16,000 pounds my range is less than 300 miles, which is okay with me because we stop every 2 or 3 hours anyway.

I carry three 5-gallon fuel cans in my truck tool box for emergencies, just in case we miss a fuel stop or end up in an area where fuel is hard to find.

I have never bought into the theory of having a large OEM fuel capacity plus adding an auxiliary tank. I know some folks that are hauling over 100 gallons of fuel. They think they are saving money because they can shop around and save .10 a gallon when filling up. Problem is they are lugging around about 500 - 600 pounds of extra weight they don't need to, which is probably taking care of all that savings.

Even if you do save a couple of dollars once and awhile by installing an auxiliary tank, it would probably take you 15 or 20 years to recover the cost of the install. I guess if you can get behind the wheel and drive non-stop for 12 or 14 hours then you may want to haul all that fuel.

I want to get out of the thing every couple of hours anyway, not a big deal to me. In the Ford the larger tank is offered in the long bed.

APT wrote:
Longer tank range rules! My prior truck was 160-180 miles typical, which rarely covered our long weekend trips each way. Now I'm over closer to 300 mile ranges which is plenty for every trip we make in Michigan's lower peninsula.

Diesel will use less fuel when towing, say 11-12mpg vs. 8-10mpg. But there are a lot of in bed auxiliary fuel tanks for diesels if whatever brand you choose is insufficient.

Agreed Range Range Range
Gives the flexibility to pick a fuel stop of your own choosing ,saving money. A time saver only if your bladder can take it,but you can choose a beautiful rest stop instead of another manic truck stop. As a owner with a truck that has multi state range it can hardly be described how beneficial big tank(s) are.