|
Hi Carl, Payback on my 02 F350 DRW PSD 6spd 4x4 is about 70k miles of my planned schedule of 20mpg empty and 10mpg towing. So far I'm exceeding that as I'm getting 14mpg pulling 16k GCW and get 19.2mpg empty. I drive differant than most as I drive for fuel ecomony at all times by pulling at maximum torque rpm or 1600rpm on my 7.3. On grades I found that 1750rpm actually pulls best. I recently did two 1900mile AZ to Co trips, thats 1400ft to 11000ft, and got 13.9mpg on the Aug trip and 14.1mpg average on the Oct trip pulling my 16k GCW load. Towing was 1300 miles out of 1900 miles. Same trip on my gasser was 7.2mpg average. My gasser fuel cost was $2088 for 2001 and $713 for my PSD in 2003 for approx the same total miles driven. These were the only two years that I pulled the same load each time as I rarely drive empty. I Can't compare maintance as my big block gasser was 27yrs old but oil change cost on my PSD is $68yr for 10k miles. There's no preformance comparrison between my gasser and my PSD as the PSD just out pulls the gasser hands down. Pulling a 8% grade my gasser was at 25mph maximum and 35mph for my PSD but the PSD could have pullled at 55mph had I wanted to add the extra fuel. The reason you will see mileage reports all over the place is most are using the overhead puter (known not to be accurate) for reporting mileage where as I use filler neck to filler neck hand calculations. There is also a training period that you need to do with all drive by wire fuel systems. There very picky on how there driven for fuel mileage. I personally would go rent a V-10, then pull a load for a couple hundred miles then go rent a PSD and pull the same load over the same road. I think you'll end up buying the diesel. T_Bone
|