I have a 2013 F150 FX4 5.0L, 33" Tires (275/70/R18), 2.5" Level, 5* tuned. i recently bought a 2007 weekend warrior FK2100 Superlite and took it out on its maiden voyage to the desert this past weekend. there's a pretty large grade hill i have to cross to get there and on the way there at night temps were in the mid 70's my truck pulled it no problem i just had a little bit of an issue when it got steep and the 5.0 was trying but i could only go so fast. anyway on the way home we left around noon and the temps were in the high 90's (98* most of the time) 3/4 of the way up the hill my trans temp started rising higher and higher took a look at the temp readout on the cluster and it was at 230* and climbing by the time i got over it was at 235* and the needle was in the yellow. waited about 10 minutes for it to cool off and we were on our way with no more heating issues. my trailer fully loaded was right at around 7500#'s which is under the tow rating of my truck. do you guys have any suggestions of what to do to help keep trans temps down? im thinking of possibly either adding or replacing the transmission cooler with a larger unit as well as a larger capacity trans pan with cooling fins. thoughts? any help is appreciated. thank you.

 

You can try fabricating a heatshield for the exhaust close to the tranny. Some people have tried an AFE tranny pan with success due to the bigger pan.

I think adding a tranny cooler with a fan is the best bet to keep it cool.

On another note the only time my tranny reached 220 was when I towed a boat up to Big Bear through the curvy slow roads. You might want to ask your dealer whats up if you have any type of Towing Package.

 

thanks for that info. i'm due for an oil change soon, ill bring this up to them to see what they think about it as well.

 

Maybe it's just in my head, but I noticed with my 5 star tunes that my trans temp seemed to rise more quickly than with my stock tune or MPT tune. And my MPT tunes seems to not get as high during HWY speeds and seems to cool down slightly quicker as well.

But here are some options for bigger coolers and fans. A lot of Raptor guys running the bigger pans have noticed cooler temps as well.

Upgrading Stock OEM Trans Cooler

Alpha 1 Ford Raptor Transmission Cooler System

RPG Transmission Cooler Kit

 

Not sure if Eco and 5.0 would yield same teams temps. Highest I ever saw was like 210 when I was doing heavy acceleration for longer periods with 8k lb trailer. Once I slowed to steady speeds back down into the 190s. The Eco holds gears better - so maybe that would keep my transmission temps lower then a 5.0? If so it could explain why my temps don't really rise, even when pulling very large grades?

Sorry if I'm not helping here...

 

that's interesting... ive never used anyone elses tunes so i have no way of comparing. but like i said before it was just that one time that the temps shot up. other than that the temps were perfect the whole trips.

those are good recommendations, kinda expensive, but it would be worth it specially if i will be towing in these conditions again.

man i miss my 6.0L Powerstroke... lol...

 

my trans temps were averaging 195-205 the whole trip, but it was just that one part of the climb where it spiked. i had gears 4-6 cancelled out so it would stay in a high gear which helped a lot. i was staying at a steady 55mph most of the climb and my rpms would stay right under 4K.

 

I figured out a little secret while towing a 4 seat sand car on a heavy trailer behind my buddy's supercharged 6.2 raptor on 37s. Don't trust the computer to control your tranny when towing up hills. I know the combo isn't ideal for towing but we were in a pinch and it's all we had. I found that if you ran a higher rpm in a lower gear in manual mode the tranny temps would stay down and suprisingingly not kill fuel mileage either. Now it was easy to judge which gear to be in as I was watching the boost gauge but I got the tranny wanting to run at 245 on a slight grade to 201 on a 6% grade headed up to camp Verde in az from phx.

 

for the climb up the grade i had gears 4-6 cancelled out so it would stay in 3rd the whole time. rpms stayed in the 3500-4000 range. only once it kicked into 2nd but i felt nervous keeping the truck at 5000 rpms for too long so i would ease off to keep in 3rd. next time we go out (Thanksgiving weekend) i will try it out in manual mode to see if it helps.
i surprisingly did ok on gas the whole trip. made it out to the desert, made a 30 mile round trip run to walmart for a battery for my quad, and back home on a full tank. i had about 1/8 tank left when i re-fueled back home. i was pleasantly surprised.. lol

 

What ive noticed about manual mode that I really like is it locks the converter up quick and won't unlock it till you shift or come to a stop. Also rpm is good to circulate fluid through the trans giving the fluid less time to heat soak