Update: Ford f350 6.2 and heavy camper
I previously gave a brief report on how my F350 handled our camper.
Brief review of F-350 6.2 DRW and heavy camper
We just completed a 3800 mile trip with it, the truck now has 13,000+ miles on it, and with the recent (and ongoing) discussions of Gas vs Diesel I thought I would give an update.
The Camper is an AF1150 with three passengers (we picked up the third passenger the day before we left). The young lady didn't weigh much but we did bring along a substantial number of toys :).
The Truck is a 2013 F350 4x4 DRW CC 6.2L 4.3 in Lariat trim that we special ordered (couldn't find a gas DRW in Lariat trim anywhere in the west - a lot of XL's in white but that was it). One of the reasons we ordered the gas engine was the nearly 1,000 pound penalty in the payload capacity for the diesel in our configuration. The truck has a GVWR of 14,000 and the one time I weighed the truck and camper with full tanks and loaded for travel it came in at 13,700 pounds.
We traveled from Seattle for a week out to the my mom's place on the Minnesota South Dakota Border, spent a week, and spent a week coming back. Included in the trip were substantial mountain passes and grades including the Big Horn mountains in Wyoming at 9,000+ feet (descended US Route 14A which is a 10% grade) as well as through the Beartooth Mountains on US 212 (10,700 ft pass).
Mountains: No lack of power going up at any point or any elevation. I could accelerate at will and drive at any speed limited only by how comfortable I felt on the twists and turns of the passes (By the way, the truck handles great in the curves, probably due to the DRW). The engine does spin but it is very comfortable doing so. Going down I didn't have to use the brakes, the engine provided plenty of breaking by itself happily spinning as it did so.
Plains and small rolling plains: The truck just sat in sixth gear and hummed merrily along.
Large rolling plains: This was more interesting. If I controlled it everything was fine with an occasional downshift as needed. However, I like to drive in cruise control. If the hills were big enough (and depending on the wind) the truck would hit the hill and start to lose speed, drop down to fifth where it could hold speed but not make up the lost speed, so drop again to fourth so it could accelerate back to the set speed. I guess you could deal with this by just locking out sixth but I kind of had fun "driving" the truck. When I was about to hit a big enough hill that I felt this would happen I would lock out sixth and then unlock it as the truck downshifted and started to climb the hill. This would let the truck climb in fifth and switch back whenever it was comfortable. Kind of became a game to decide if I should have the transmission downshift or not at the start of the hill (the things we will do to amuse ourselves when driving long distances :)) I have no doubt this wouldn't be necessary in a diesel.
MPG: For the whole trip I averaged 9.1 mpg. Big deal here is speed and wind (not really mountain passes. For those you get poor mileage up but make it up going down). For my rig 63 - 65 mph seems to be the sweet spot in that I get decent gas mileage with decent speed. Above 65 the mileage drops pretty fast. I think I was getting 7.5 at 80 mph. At 40 - 45 (construction zones) I was getting great mileage but that is too slow. Not surprisingly wind can make a huge difference. For part of the trip we were getting 30 mph winds with 40+ mph gusts. Cruising with that wind largely at our back I was getting 12.5 mpg. Fighting the wind I was in the 7's at 65 mph.
In summary I am still very happy with the truck (and camper). It was the right choice for us. There is a lot of debate about gas vs diesel engines and there are pros and cons to both. People should weigh the advantageous and disadvantageous for their use and select what they think will work best for them (it is nice that there our such good choices). I do think, however, that any of the newer gas engines (Ford 6.2, GM 6.0, Dodge 6.4) coupled with the modern 6+ speed transmissions have more than enough power and ability to handle any size truck camper you would dare to put on the truck. Looking at my truck the GCWR is 22,500 pounds so the 14,000 pound truck and camper isn't anywhere close to the rating limit the engine can handle. If you haul a trailer too the equation may change depending on its weight.
I will end with a picture of us dispersed camping in the Big Horn Mountains
Brief review of F-350 6.2 DRW and heavy camper
We just completed a 3800 mile trip with it, the truck now has 13,000+ miles on it, and with the recent (and ongoing) discussions of Gas vs Diesel I thought I would give an update.
The Camper is an AF1150 with three passengers (we picked up the third passenger the day before we left). The young lady didn't weigh much but we did bring along a substantial number of toys :).
The Truck is a 2013 F350 4x4 DRW CC 6.2L 4.3 in Lariat trim that we special ordered (couldn't find a gas DRW in Lariat trim anywhere in the west - a lot of XL's in white but that was it). One of the reasons we ordered the gas engine was the nearly 1,000 pound penalty in the payload capacity for the diesel in our configuration. The truck has a GVWR of 14,000 and the one time I weighed the truck and camper with full tanks and loaded for travel it came in at 13,700 pounds.
We traveled from Seattle for a week out to the my mom's place on the Minnesota South Dakota Border, spent a week, and spent a week coming back. Included in the trip were substantial mountain passes and grades including the Big Horn mountains in Wyoming at 9,000+ feet (descended US Route 14A which is a 10% grade) as well as through the Beartooth Mountains on US 212 (10,700 ft pass).
Mountains: No lack of power going up at any point or any elevation. I could accelerate at will and drive at any speed limited only by how comfortable I felt on the twists and turns of the passes (By the way, the truck handles great in the curves, probably due to the DRW). The engine does spin but it is very comfortable doing so. Going down I didn't have to use the brakes, the engine provided plenty of breaking by itself happily spinning as it did so.
Plains and small rolling plains: The truck just sat in sixth gear and hummed merrily along.
Large rolling plains: This was more interesting. If I controlled it everything was fine with an occasional downshift as needed. However, I like to drive in cruise control. If the hills were big enough (and depending on the wind) the truck would hit the hill and start to lose speed, drop down to fifth where it could hold speed but not make up the lost speed, so drop again to fourth so it could accelerate back to the set speed. I guess you could deal with this by just locking out sixth but I kind of had fun "driving" the truck. When I was about to hit a big enough hill that I felt this would happen I would lock out sixth and then unlock it as the truck downshifted and started to climb the hill. This would let the truck climb in fifth and switch back whenever it was comfortable. Kind of became a game to decide if I should have the transmission downshift or not at the start of the hill (the things we will do to amuse ourselves when driving long distances :)) I have no doubt this wouldn't be necessary in a diesel.
MPG: For the whole trip I averaged 9.1 mpg. Big deal here is speed and wind (not really mountain passes. For those you get poor mileage up but make it up going down). For my rig 63 - 65 mph seems to be the sweet spot in that I get decent gas mileage with decent speed. Above 65 the mileage drops pretty fast. I think I was getting 7.5 at 80 mph. At 40 - 45 (construction zones) I was getting great mileage but that is too slow. Not surprisingly wind can make a huge difference. For part of the trip we were getting 30 mph winds with 40+ mph gusts. Cruising with that wind largely at our back I was getting 12.5 mpg. Fighting the wind I was in the 7's at 65 mph.
In summary I am still very happy with the truck (and camper). It was the right choice for us. There is a lot of debate about gas vs diesel engines and there are pros and cons to both. People should weigh the advantageous and disadvantageous for their use and select what they think will work best for them (it is nice that there our such good choices). I do think, however, that any of the newer gas engines (Ford 6.2, GM 6.0, Dodge 6.4) coupled with the modern 6+ speed transmissions have more than enough power and ability to handle any size truck camper you would dare to put on the truck. Looking at my truck the GCWR is 22,500 pounds so the 14,000 pound truck and camper isn't anywhere close to the rating limit the engine can handle. If you haul a trailer too the equation may change depending on its weight.
I will end with a picture of us dispersed camping in the Big Horn Mountains
