While all these suggestion are good I've found in my experience that towing a heavier TT on any type of steep grade is frustrating. The 3.5 and I'm guessing the 2.7 are just too small displacement to provide any real engine braking.

 

Yes we do.

T/H made coming down the I-40 Black Mountain grade much easier than it was in our old Explorer without it. It also helped to keep the transmission from up shifting too early going up.

 

Go easy until you know what is going on with the brakes. I would stop every now and again and check brake temps at each wheel using your hand. If any brake is hot than let it cool. This trick may also tell you which set of brakes is working the hardest and thus allow you to adjust your trailer brake bias.

 

The truck's front brakes are always the hottest so no need for your "trick". If you do decide to check don't use your hand use an IR temperature gun. Going down the Million Dollar Hwy if you touch the brakes with your hand you will more than likely burn the skin off.
No gasser will ever have engine braking like a diesel so lock out the upper gears. 2nd gives good braking

 

Has to be said: most important aspect to towing safely (uphill OR downhill) will be your overall setup. With a trailer over 5k lbs on a 2.7eco you have to be really pressing the limits of the tow specs. Make sure you are properly setup with weight distribution, sway control, etc.

 

I have a 2016 F150 SuperCab 2.7V6 Ecoboost. I don't know whether it's a Select Shift or not, I don't know what that means. I have only one experience towing a 3,500# - 4,000# U-Haul, plus quite a bit of hauling a fully loaded bed. It was almost effortless.

From my research (on this forum, thank you everyone), I've determined that to do what you want to do I'd have to add a factory trailer brake controller and use a weight distributing hitch with a sway controller for anything over 5,000#.

I don't know whether it's true, but there seems to be a consensus that you should always use tow/haul mode when pulling a trailer or having any significant weight in the bed. One post said (true?) that T/H mode has a feature that provides additional cooling or something to minimize transmission heat under stress. I don't know but T/H has been very effective for me with many heavy loads in the bed -- ~1,500# -- and with the U-Haul. (A lot of steep hills where I live.)

I would just use T/H and not worry about manually locking out gears, although there are one or two long, steep grades I occasionally travel where I might lock out a couple of gears temporarily. I don't think you have to use "M" to do that, you just hit the "-" button on the gear shift and hit "+" when you're done. I think using "M" (Manual Shift) is more difficult than just locking out high gears in "D" by hitting the + or - button.

You should be fine as long as you don't overload the towing and payload capacities. You'll have to read the documentation and do some math. There are a lot of threads on the subject and I'm not an expert.

Good luck and have fun!

 

A lot of people are talking about locking out the top 2 gears in order to slow the truck down but that will never work or happen. Gas engines are very limited in their ability to engine brake and all you are going to do is over rev the engine as it tries to hold back a load that it has no chance of stopping. I'm not saying it won't help but it won't help anywhere near as much as you may think. Brakes are your only option for slowing or stopping and overheated brakes will not stop anything so stop, check your brakes for heat and then either let them rest or carry on your merry way.

As far as how hot is too hot, who really knows . I use my hand and if I can't touch the hub because its to hot than to me its time to stop. You can use a heat gun but that will only tell you the difference between each of the brakes and will not give you what should be the upper limit of 'too hot'. So what is 'too hot' according to a heat gun? Is it 100 degrees, is it 200 degrees is it 500 degrees? No one knows because there is no printed data on it but I will say this, using a heat gun to tell you which set of brakes is running hotter than the rest is far more intelligent than me using my hand. So maybe my 'trick' isn't perfect but it will let you know when 'hot is hot'.

A lot of hilly areas have emergency run-offs at the bottom of the hill where you can, in an emergency, drive into and stop if you should lose braking. A lot of hilly areas also have designated pull over areas where you can let the brakes rest and maybe get a little rest yourself.

Bottom line here is take it easy, take your time and enjoy your ride. Also, just to let you know, that nothing scares me more than a truck coming towards me with guy driving it looking like he just saw a horror show....and I'm about to be in it!

 

Driving With An Automatic

With certain automatic overdrive transmissions, towing – especially in hilly areas – may cause excessive shifting between overdrive and the next lower gear. • To eliminate this condition and achieve steadier performance, overdrive can be locked out (see vehicle Owner’s Manual) • If excessive shifting does not occur, use overdrive to optimize fuel economy • Overdrive may also be locked out to obtain engine braking on downgrades • When available, select tow/haul mode to automatically eliminate unwanted gear search and help control vehicle speed when going downhill.

 

I love the engine braking of my 2.7 in tow/haul. I can maintain 30 mph or so on a good 4-6% grade down the mountain. I tap the brakes every once and a while but hardly at all. Never worried yet about my brakes overheating.

 

Tow/Haul works great as everyone has already said.

Another thing that helps more than people realize, is slow down before you start heading downhill. I've seen several trucks come blasting over Loveland Pass and see them sitting in the lot at Arapahoe Basin with a brake fire.