deciding between 2500 and 1500 - help

steveo2155 · July 2, 2016

Considering another truck in the near future. Would like to stay around 30k at the most. It would be used as an everyday driver plus hauling misc. items in the bed, atv and occasionally towing. I feel like half ton trucks are priced so outrageously and I have been looking at a few duramaxs online and they don't seem to be far off. I also like the crew cab with the 6 1/2 ft bed. I would like to stay in the 2007-2013 range. I am definitely not familiar with diesels as I have never owned one. I know I don't NEED one but for the right price and the convenience of having the power and towing capacity when I could use it, am I crazy for considering this? I have a few questions also.

1. When year did the DEF start and is this a positive or a negative?

2. What is high miles for a diesel and in the 30k range for crew cab with the short bed, what mileage range should I be expecting?

3. How does mpg compare with half ton of the same year range?

4. Is the Allison transmission in all duramax and is this a 'must have'?

5. What are the maintenance differences between diesels and gas?

6. How often do the injectors go bad in the 07-13 year range and approx. replacement cost? Any other major expenses vs gasoline engine?

Thanks.

jhplak325 · July 2, 2016

1 - 2007.5 to 2010 Duramax (LMM) have DPF emissions. 2011 to current year (2016) Duramax (LML) have DPF and require DEF. I know 2011's have issues with the DEF system since it was the first year.

2 - This is like any other used vehicle, how hard did the previous owner abuse the vehicle and how maintained was it.

3 - In my honest opinion, there are to many vairiables for MPG for comparison. Based on how I run my trucks, my 15 Duramax is getting the best fuel mileage when I compare it to the 05 Silverado 1500 with the 5.3 and the 09 Silverado 2500HD with thr 6.0.

4 - Any Duramax with an automatic transmission in a truck gets the Allison.

5 & 6 - Anything labeled for diesel cost more.

If I recall, in the years you are looking at, there was no 6 1/2' bed on any crew cab 1500 series trucks. This was the reason why I went back to 3/4 ton trucks in 2009, I need a crew cab due to family size.

If you are not going to work the diesel and only use it for groceries, you are better off looking at gas.

You probably get into a 2014 half ton for the price you are looking at spending.

Raptordude · July 2, 2016

I don't know a whole bunch about the science of the DEF, DPF, diesel emissions, etc. but I do know this. Those systems are suicide for a Diesel engine. The only way a modern Diesel engine will last is if those systems are professionally deleted, and maybe head studs are thrown in as well. Also, my friends dad just bought a 2015 2500HD duramax. He gets 9 mpg around town. 9!!!! Granted, he can get around 20 on the highway, and he's a pretty wild driver, but still. Also, with the DEF and various emission systems, it seems very corked up when towing his race trailer. Anyway, the only reason people buy diesels are because of the reliability and the increase in fuel mileage. Well, with the new setup, fuel mileage (around town) is crap. I'm getting 13.5 around town in my gas 6.0. So I'm doing significantly better than his diesel. Also, with the emission systems they have, stock vs stock, a gas motor will probably last longer. So reliability is down the drain too. The old diesels are the good ones. My dad has 233,000 miles on his 1998 ford 7.3......k&n intake, no cats, no emissions of any kind. He gets 17mpg around town......just my 2 cents. Diesels are great as long as you can delete the emissions, but with the emissions, they're junk

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jhplak325 · July 3, 2016

I don't know a whole bunch about the science of the DEF, DPF, diesel emissions, etc. but I do know this. Those systems are suicide for a Diesel engine. The only way a modern Diesel engine will last is if those systems are professionally deleted, and maybe head studs are thrown in as well. Also, my friends dad just bought a 2015 2500HD duramax. He gets 9 mpg around town. 9!!!! Granted, he can get around 20 on the highway, and he's a pretty wild driver, but still. Also, with the DEF and various emission systems, it seems very corked up when towing his race trailer. Anyway, the only reason people buy diesels are because of the reliability and the increase in fuel mileage. Well, with the new setup, fuel mileage (around town) is crap. I'm getting 13.5 around town in my gas 6.0. So I'm doing significantly better than his diesel. Also, with the emission systems they have, stock vs stock, a gas motor will probably last longer. So reliability is down the drain too. The old diesels are the good ones. My dad has 233,000 miles on his 1998 ford 7.3......k&n intake, no cats, no emissions of any kind. He gets 17mpg around town......just my 2 cents. Diesels are great as long as you can delete the emissions, but with the emissions, they're junk

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When I compare the fuel mileage between the 09 Silverado 2500HD with 6.0 that I had and current 15 DenaliHD with Duramax, around town both are the same, around 9/10.

Open highway, the 6.0 was around 13/14. The Duramax I have seen between 21 and 26, but typically around 21.

Towing my travel trailer, 6.0 was typically 6/7 with an occasional 9. Duramax, I am seeng 12/13 and I think this can increase on flat ground and not pulling the mountains here in the northeast.

Cowpie · July 3, 2016

The downstream emissions stuff is not nearly as bad on the engine as the EGR is. And that can be programmed out of the ECM relatively easy. No hardware, no wrench turning. EGR generates more soot for the DPF to capture, and by shutting it down, DPF regen events are significantly reduced and system lasts longer with fewer problems. And oil doesn't have to deal with nearly as much soot as well. A win-win all the way around.

MPG is one thing, but it is the cost of operation per mile that actually means anything. MPG alone doesn't tell the whole story. It is a nice feeling to see good MPG, but one may not be actually saving anything if the cost per mile is not lower.

Wintersun · July 17, 2016

Fleet operators with thousands of trucks on the road prefer DEF systems as it reduces engine maintenance requirements overall. DEF also keeps the air that we all have to breathe a lot cleaner and considering the more then $12 billion in hospital costs alone for treating asthma attacks it is stupid to sabotage the emissions control systems.

A diesel truck costs at least $10,000 more to buy new and this is reflected in the cost to buy a used truck. Maintenance costs are double that for a gas engine and a new set of injectors can set you back $4,000 or more - about the cost of a new gas engine for a truck.

Diesel makes sense for heavy towing, i.e. over 10,000 lbs. on a regular basis. Fuel economy is better with a diesel but not enough to overcome the other operating costs. I get 13-14 MPG with my 2011 Duramax and a comparable truck with a gas engine would be in the 8-10 MPG range. I do go a lot further on a tank of fuel but then I often need to as there are far fewer stations where I can buy diesel.

Unfortunately too many gullible people pay much too much for their new trucks and so when the trucks are 3-4 years old the amount remaining on their bank loan is in the $40k range even for trucks with more than 45,000 miles on them. I paid $42K cash for my fully loaded 2011 Duramax in late 2011 and a gas 1500 truck at MSRP would cost me a lot more than that.

Best to use a search engine to find a truck on craigslist that is a 1500 and with low mileage and not lifted or otherwise screwed up by its current owner. I had to drive 120 miles to buy my truck but saved more than $6000 in the process. Compared to a Denali I saved about $25,000.

Half ton truck payload and tow capacities have increased a great deal over the years and exceed that of 3/4 ton pickups being produced 20 years ago. Most will tow up to 7500 lbs with no problems at all.

Cowpie · July 17, 2016

Fleet operators with thousands of trucks on the road prefer DEF systems as it reduces engine maintenance requirements overall. DEF also keeps the air that we all have to breathe a lot cleaner and considering the more then $12 billion in hospital costs alone for treating asthma attacks it is stupid to sabotage the emissions control systems.

You are kidding, right? I am in commercial trucking and have been for over 3 decades. Fleet operators "prefer" DEF systems as it reduces engine maintenance requirements? Please, roll one of whatever you are smoking and share it with the rest of us. I own commercial trucks and that is the most asinine statement I have heard in a while. One of the biggest chagrins to fleet operators has been the emissions reduction requirements of modern diesels and the associated costs in both terms of initial purchase and downtime. The downtime ratios have exploded and overall equipment costs have taken a much larger slice of the budgets. CBR is significantly lower as is ROI's. And there is no proof that the emissions stuff has eliminated $12 million in hospital costs. And certainly not since Obummercare has inflated the cost of both medical insurance and actual medical costs to an insane level. There is no way to prove your assertion. There is no way to ascertain that diesel fumes were the actual cause of individual asthma attacks and other respiratory related problems. Pollen causes problem too, as does thousands of other things that can trigger attacks. There is no way to separate out one particular item and prove it was the primary cause or reduction in asthma attacks. Stress alone, nothing related to actual atmospheric conditions, has triggered significant numbers of asthma and other respiratory related problems.

I have been alive long enough to not fall for the party line of the greenie crowd anymore. I clearly remember the real pollution days of the 60' and 70's, and air became significantly cleaner in the recent years before DEF/DPF systems were even implemented. There was a common joke back in those heavy pollution days, that no one trusted air they couldn't see. These DEF/DPF systems have not had nearly the dramatic effect on cleaning things up as has computer controlled engines, better piston and head design, and dozens of other positive improvements to internal combustion engines have happened. Making turbo charging a standard feature of all on-road diesels has done more for cleaning up things than DEF/DPF systems alone. Get behind a commercial semi truck rolling down the road, on a heavy pull, and doing a DPF regen and tell us how much you like the wonderful feeling you get breathing that nice clean smoke coming out of the exhaust. Now that would trigger a asthma attack if anything would. That is some real nasty stuff coming out those trucks doing a DPF burn off. I deal with it every week as a commercial operator.

You have to ask yourself, if fleets "love" this so much, then why to many commercial truck owners like myself buy Class 6/7/8 "glider kit" trucks, which are new truck chassis and bodies without engines or transmissions, from the OEM, and then we install factory remanned pre-emission engines in them. Totally legal and compliant with federal regulations. As I write this, I am looking out the window at a 2013 Freightliner class 8 truck, a factory Dupont Dodge Viper Blue Pearl Elite paint job, with a factory remanned MY 2000 Detroit pre-emission engine in it. One the best overall purchases I have made in both terms of initial cost and the operation cost during it's 567,000 miles on the road. I saved, now dig this, almost $40,000 in initial purchase cost for that one truck over a similarly spec'd class 8 with new engine and all the emissions stuff on it. And I average a full 25% better fuel economy with it than the national fleet average of class 8 commercial trucks that have all that emissions stuff. The national class 8 fleet average, trucks with gross permits loads of up to 80,000 lb, is around 6.5 mpg. My average is 7.93 mpg pulling the same loads over the same highways. One truck alone, by getting that better fuel economy, is saving over $10,000 a year just in fuel costs.

Give the Technology Maintenance Council of the American Trucking Association, the de facto standards committee in fleet vehicle maintenance practices in N. America, a call and ask them how much fleet operators dearly love all this emissions stuff and how it has "reduced" their maintenance costs. Be forewarned, if someone at the other end doesn't hang up thinking it is a prank call, they will probably let you in on the latest swear words.

franco4027 · July 22, 2016

As someone who has worked on diesel trucks and boats it is much more beneficial to have quality fuel, good injectors and injection pumps than any add-on emissions. Inefficient engines burn more fuel. More fuel in=more pollution. Using more fuel also means more exploration. That generated more abuse on the environment. The typical light truck diesel market is not putting a dent in pollution generation overall. As far as putting a diesel in a light truck, the only way you will recoup your initial cost is if you tow for a living.

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