Calling All Travel Trailer Owners

[jdolotina]

I am going camping this weekend with the wife, and plan on pulling a 30 footer behind the truck. I have a NBS ext. cab 3.73 standard box with the 6.0L. The trailer itself weighs in at 6300 lbs. My question is with a 3 1/2 hour drive to Hot Springs; should I keep the truck in third gear or just use the tow haul mode. I have never towed with a 4 speed tranny, and really don't know what to expect. My job requires me to tow a 16' trailer weighing in at 10,000 lbs, but we use a 3/4 ton chevy deisel with an allison. Which pulls pretty d**n good. Anyways, if anybody has any helpful advice please let me know. Oh and currently I am running premium 93 octane in the truck if that makes a difference.

 

Thanks, Josh

[ChrisNJ]

Just leave it in tow/haul mode, and run 87 octane.

[C & A s Dad]

I realize your 6.0L is more powerful than my 02 5.3L but am running 4.10 gears. I will tell you what I do.

 

I always run in 3rd with Tow Haul engaged.but you also have to realize I never tow over 65 MPH on the Interstate and most of the time I am on 2 lane roads running at 50 to 55 max. I am towing a 29' 6500 lb camper and 3rd gear keeps my 5.3L in it's sweet spot (2,200 to 2,500)and keeps my trans temps well below 170. Our engines like to rev and they will run all day doing it.

 

I would tell you that if you can tow at safe speeds and your engine has the torque to keep your transmission in OD without downshifting, then OD is fine. My guess is you would be fine on completely flat roads but when you reach some hills, you will find it downshifting more than you would like. Remember, the shifting up and down is what builds trans temps. Keeping it in one gear with the converter locked will help keep those temps down.

 

I will have to respectfuly disagree with Chris on the 93 octane. I would highly recommend it at least while towing and especially in hot weather. I have nothing but my Butt Dyno to prove it, but I can promise you my truck pulls hills better with 93. I run it all the time because I am never realy sure when I may be pulling my camper.

 

I would also tell you to watch your trans temps if you have a gauge. If you see temps much above 200, consider upgrading your aux cooler.

[SinisterSS]

Used to tow about 5,000 lbs with my 6.0 but with 4.10 gears.

 

Burn the 93, use T/H mode, leave it in 4th unless you find it shifting between 3rd and 4th too much. When coming up on a big hill, I'd usually pull it down into 3rd at the bottom of the hill before going up. Much easier on the truck.

[Genuinefine409]

Used to tow about 5,000 lbs with my 6.0 but with 4.10 gears.

 

Burn the 93, use T/H mode, leave it in 4th unless you find it shifting between 3rd and 4th too much. When coming up on a big hill, I'd usually pull it down into 3rd at the bottom of the hill before going up. Much easier on the truck.

 

 

I use 4th as well in T/H mode with the 6.0 and 4.10 gears. I only pull it into third if I am not going over 55-60ish or if I am coming up to a big hill. I pull trailer that weighs about 7500.

[mljenkins]

I am going camping this weekend with the wife, and plan on pulling a 30 footer behind the truck. I have a NBS ext. cab 3.73 standard box with the 6.0L. The trailer itself weighs in at 6300 lbs. My question is with a 3 1/2 hour drive to Hot Springs; should I keep the truck in third gear or just use the tow haul mode. I have never towed with a 4 speed tranny, and really don't know what to expect. My job requires me to tow a 16' trailer weighing in at 10,000 lbs, but we use a 3/4 ton chevy deisel with an allison. Which pulls pretty d**n good. Anyways, if anybody has any helpful advice please let me know. Oh and currently I am running premium 93 octane in the truck if that makes a difference.

 

Thanks, Josh

 

 

Leave it in drive and use tow haul mode. I have a 5.3L w/ 4.10 and I pull my 7000 lb gooseneck horse trailer around no problem in drive. The only time I downshift is on steep hills. Towed it 600 miles this summer over small hills to Columbus and had the cruise set most of the way except where the hills got steep here in West Virginia.

 

Matt

[Gozer]

I have a similar travel trailer weight, and I tow in OD with T/H mode engaged with my 6.0L/4.10. There are a lot of mountains (really hills to folks out west!) in Eastern PA, so I will manually kick it into 3rd when necessary. Only occasionally do I need to let it shift down to 2nd to maintain 55-60 on the big grades. I've only run 87 octane since I bought it, and I haven't had any issues towing with it .

 

BTW, does the torque converter lock-up in OD only, or does it also in 3rd?

[SinisterSS]

Yes, the converter locks in 3rd once highway speeds are reached...

 

 

[imnutz66]

Why do people waste money on 93 octane in vehicles designed to run on 87?

[C & A s Dad]

Depends on you definition of waste.

 

You will find opinons all over the board on this. The fact is I get about .5 better MPG on 93 octane, I use Chevron branded fuel with Techron and the 93 octane has much more Techron than the 87 and IMO, my truck pulls my camper better on 93.

 

The use of 93 vs 87 is all based on the fact that our engines are fairly high compression (9.0 to 1 or 9.5 to 1) and without the knock sensors instructing the computer to retard the timing, they would ping their butts off. However, GM has designed them to run on 87 by pulling the timing back until the ping goes away, which removes power and tq. The computer slowly moves the timing back up until the knock sensors detect ping (detonation) again and pulls the timing back again. With 93, the timing can be run much higher before detonation occurs, which provides better performance, power and tq.

 

I have an '02 5.3 with a scan gauge installed, which will read Knock Retard. Just the past weekend, for the fun of it, I set it to read this function and drove the truck normally for about 5 miles with the knock retard reading 0 on my scan gauge. I then loaded the engine a few times with a slow roll of the throttle trying not to allow it to catch a lower gear. Again, no knock retard at all. I then nailed the throttle a few times and let it wind up to the shift points and one time, the knock retard read 3 for a nanosecond and went right back to 0.

 

I cannot say for sure, but my guess is if I did the same with 87, I would see the knock retard showing that the timing was being pulled back. You can research this if you like, but you will find many guys on this forum who tow often have found benefit in 93 octane fuel.

[SinisterSS]

My LQ9 6.0 needed 93. It's not a question of wasting money.

[Genuinefine409]

Why do people waste money on 93 octane in vehicles designed to run on 87?

 

 

I would never run any engine on 87 unless its a old engine with 8.0 or 8.5:1 compression ratio. newer engines are over 9, i think the 6.0 is like 9.4:1. You can run 87, they will recommend 87, but it needs 91. with the sunoco 94 you used to be able to run 10.5 to 11:1 compression with that. I notice a difference with running 93 versus 87 so i always use it. If you want to really see what gas does what, get a carb'd engine with same compression and try running 87 octane gas, it won't like it unless you retard your timing which decreases power which defeats the purpose. injected engines can adapt for lower octane fuel but it does cost power.

[bschott]

I've got an '07 Chevy LTZ w/6.0L NBS Extended cab with the 6.0L as well running with the stock 3.73 gears and pull a 7200lb 31foot TT mostly without the "tow-haul" mode button pressed. I dont really care for the fact that it holds the gears so long. I'm ok with it on down grades, but otherwise not for straight highway pulling.

 

I must really beat mine as I'm doing 60-70 with it typically, and I've seen a high of 225 (hot day -- long hill) on the tranny temp, but average around 190 to 195 (summer)-- perhaps I should slow it down a bit.

 

Really, I think that the tranny is what holds this truck back, I feel that it should be like a 5 or 6 speed to keep the engine in it's sweet spot where as mine either feels that's it's lugging too much, or revving too high in my opinion.

 

I will say, that when you do slow your speeds to the 55-60 mph range, it does seem to feel/fare better. In the long run, I probably should have opted for the 4.10 gears, but I drive without the trailer more, than with.

[pwall]

Since the gas companies add octance to the gas, makes you wonder why we just don't have 91 (or 93) and forget 87.

Just a thought.....

[C & A s Dad]

Patrcik, I tried about 10 tanks of 93 in my work van, a 3.3L Dodge Caravan and it made absolutely not difference in this little motor. The comp ratio is something close to 8 to 1 and there is just not enough compression there to take advantage of higher octane. For this reason, and the fact that many people would never see any advantage to using 93, there will always be 87 octane.

 

Brian, with trans temps like that, I would strongly suggest you upgrade your aux cooler assuming you have the OE aux cooler now. You can replace it with the same stacked plate design that is about 2x times the size of the OE unit. Of course if you live in part of the country that gets some really cold temps in the winter, you do not want the largest cooler out there. However, if you live in a warm climate as I do, you would be doing your trans a favor by upgrading to a 11" x 11" x 3/4" stacked plate cooler.