Trip Report - 5000 miles in two weeks

BeauTie · August 8, 2016

Just finished a two-week 5000-mile National Park tour and camping trip around the western US in my new-ish 2016 Silverado Crew Cab (5.3L, 3.42, 6-spd, 4x4). This was practically the first road trip we took in it (family of 4) and this is my first full-size so it was an interesting trip. I thought I would post some miscellaneous observations:

- Overall, I was pleased. Other than cracking the windshield (ugh) on the drive back home, we didn't really have any issues. I drove the entire trip with the transmission in M and with grade braking off and thought that was pretty decent. I wanted to be able to bump the transmission down to M5, M4, or M3 when going down grades of various types or running with slow tourist traffic and I thought that worked pretty well.

- We were tent camping so no towing but we had a couple hundred pounds of stuff in the bed covered by a Fold-a-cover G4 Elite and I thought the ride was a little better with the extra weight back there as others have reported.

- My truck doesn't really vibrate but I would say that the ride is sometimes kind of "busy" at 70 mph. We spent most of our time in states with 75 or 80 mph speed limits and I found it was nice and smooth at 75-80 mph. Gas mileage took a hit at those speeds of course but the truck felt great. I was a little concerned that some amount of vibration might develop as I accumulated miles during the trip but I never really felt anything at any speed that I considered to be a significant vibration so that was good.

- Looking at the fuel receipts, we did 4920 miles on 243 gallons for an overall hand calc average of 20.2 mpg. I drive relatively conservatively so I hoped to do a little better than that but the speed limits were high and we had such long distances and considerable hilly to mountainous terrain to cover that it wasn't a good test for max fuel economy. The best tank reported by the DIC was 23.8 mpg across 440 miles of Montana with a hand calc was 22.8 mpg. I watched the 25 mile average hit 26-27 mpg multiple times while driving on flat-ish slower roads around 50-55 mph so it's capable of nicer numbers but not at 75-80 mph and not in stop-n-go environments. Unfortunately, we had headwinds going both east and west (Murphy) including some sustained strong winds so that didn't help. Across all 14 fill-ups, the DIC overestimated the fuel economy by an average of 0.8 mpg per tank.

- The truck was nice and comfy. I have a bad lower back so wasn't sure how it would feel through all of those miles and long days but it was good so no complaints there.

- The fuel range was nice. My family and their smaller bladders didn't necessarily think so, however.

- I wish there were more power/USB outlets for the back seat and I wish the back seat had real air vents like our 10-year old Buick Rendezvous but that's been debated here previously.

- Cruise control, displays, radio (mostly listened to XM), headlights, air conditioning, and most other things were pretty much fine. Windshield wipers don't seem to be very fast on high.

I included one photo from the trip....just a few minutes before sunrise in the Cedar Pass campground in Badlands National Park.

SteveBBB · August 9, 2016

Interesting read, thanks for posting!

SkiDooNick700 · August 9, 2016

Glad to hear about your experience. I did a 3,000 mile road trip out west a month ago to CO. You gotta give it to these trucks as far as MPG, you stated just over 20mpg despite going thru states with these higher than usual speed limits. Imagine doing that in an older 2000s truck, you'd probably be getting 15 or 16mpg lol.

tnchevy · August 9, 2016

I did a very similar trip 2 years ago but not in my truck but our Jeep GC. We put exactly 5001 miles in 2 weeks time. I agree on the gas mileage, the Jeep gets around 24 mpg around here but those high speed limits and lots of head wind had us at about 20mpg as well. I am heading back out west next week but this time I am flying out!

Crstfr · August 9, 2016

beautiful photo BeauTie......

KaptKyle · August 9, 2016

I'm curious how you managed to crack the windshield...

BeauTie · August 9, 2016

I'm curious how you managed to crack the windshield...

Nothing fancy.....driving along I-94 and heard a rock hit it and it cracked instantly. I didn't see the rock but it didn't sound like a big one so I was shocked to see the crack. It hit near the passenger side A pillar so that may have dulled the sound a bit. The crack is about 2.5 feet long.

We drove through lots of gravel roads and significant construction zones during the trip but the rock in question came during a benign stretch of I-94. Must have come off the minivan in front of me.