Guy Lawless

I come from the "diesel world," I suppose, as I traded my 2006 F-350 DRW in on a 2013 F-150.

Yes, I did have a problematic 6.0. Between talking to people at camp sites, dealerships, and the mechanics that have worked on my truck the 6.4 and the 6.7 aren't any better. In fact, some of the repairs are more expensive because it requires a cab removal due to the engine placement.

I "downgraded" to an F-150 because I, firstly, wanted to stay with Ford, and second the new F-150s have enough towing capacity to tow my RV which before just straddled inbetween the very high end of a 150 and the low to mid end of a 250.

Personally, if I were set on getting a diesel today I'd look at Dodge and steer clear of Ford SuperDuty. But I'm happy with my F-150 and the power it provides.

jcain

Puff puff pass bro

atvtinker

Obviously you haven't heard of all the problems they are having with the Dodge diesels not lasting 200,000 miles before a major breakdown. I have one of the '11 Ford F-250s with the 6.7L diesel and have yet to have it in the shop for any kind of work nor have any of the people that I know that have them. The guy that just replaced the roof on my house just had to take his Dodge back for a second re-build due to the cams failing on his and he only has 125,000 miles on his truck! And from what I heard, Dodge is still having problems with the input shaft still snapping if you tow anything close to capacity. 10 year old problem still not solved!

DaveCaver

brulaz, willieboy, smokeywren,
Thanks so much for the replies. You've given me great info. About the 16.5% tongue weight: yes, I wish it was lower. The payload of the trailer is totally fixed in place (it's a search-and-rescue training maze that's bolted in place and I can't redistribute). But the other thing is that I guess I should find a better way to measure the tongue weight. I used a lever-arm method and a bathroom scale (something like this: http://hildstrom.com/projects/tonguescale/index.html)

Now that I think about it more, it's probably pretty important that I put the tongue at the height that I'll actually be using it, since the trailer is dual axle and tipping the trailer forward or back would transfer the weight between the two axles. How do you guys measure the tongue weight?

Thanks again,
Dave

brulaz

I load everything up, including wife, and go to a CAT scale.
http://catscale.com/cat-scale-locator

Measure everything together. Then get off the scale, drop the trailer, and measure truck only.

The difference in totals is your trailer's GVW or total weight.
Subtract the trailer's axle weight as measured in the first run-through, and you'll have tongue weight.

If you have a WDH, you'll do the above with the WDH slacked. You can also run through a 3rd time with the WDH setup and see how it moves weight off the truck's rear axle and onto the trailer's axles and the truck's front axle.

smokeywren

With a Sherline tongue weight scale:

http://www.etrailer.com/Tools/Sherline/5780.html

Stack up lumber as a jackbase so when the trailer tongue jack is lowered so the coupler goes down onto the scale, the floor of the trailer will be close to level, front to rear.

I use short pieces of scrap 2x6, 2x8, 2x10, even 2x12 for the jack base under the Sherline scale. Jack the tongue jack up so the coupler is a few inches higher than the jack, then place the jack base and scale under the coupler. Then lower the tongue jack so he coupler fits onto the scale, and you'll get an accurate tongue weight.

But if you don't want to spend $125 for a tongue weight scale, then run the rig across a CAT scale twice, once with the trailer (but without the WD spring bars tightened) and once without the trailer. GVW = the combined weight on the two truck axles. Subtract the GVW without the trailer from the GVW with the trailer. The difference is tongue weight.

brulaz's use of gross trailer weight minus trailer axle weight will work too.

mflinehan

Find yourself a good 7.3 powerstroke. They're still out there with lower miles.

smokeywren

The last one was assembled in October, 2002. Over 10 years ago. Very few 10-year-old-pickups are going to be reliable, regardless of miles or TLC. Yeah, the 7.3L engine will probably last over 400,000 miles, but the rest of the pickup is just an ordinary Ford. Brakes, axles, springs, shocks, transmissions, driveshafts, altenator, air conditioning compressor, water pump, an other components will continue to fall apart.

I bought a brand new '99.5 7.3L and drove it 197,000 miles over 11 years. I installed a bulletproof BTS tranny, which today costs about $5,000. I replaced the stock intake with a Ford Severe Duty Air Induction System (AIS), had a 4" turbo-back free-flow exhaust system, an changed the oil about every 5,500 miles per oil analysis. I ran a DP-Tuner 60-tow tune and drug an 8,000-pound 5er most of those miles. When I sold it, it was still running like new. But I knew that normal wear items were going to begin going south, so I gave it up.

mflinehan

Smokey you are right once again.

DaveCaver

Thanks for your great input, smokeywren.
Of course, I've convinced myself that what I really need is an Excursion (I really need the extra seats much more than I need the truck bed). It looks like Ford stopped making these in 2005. Should I just not consider these, or should I get one with low miles? What would you consider low miles? I've seen them with 67k, 39k, etc. Also, the 2005's that I see only have the 6.0L engine. Should I worry about that engine's reliability? Thanks again for all of the help.