Rhinorider
Member
Now I know this has been done to death but I have read everyones threads about fuel mileage, fuel conditioner etc. and I thought I would add my 2 cents.
I made my first mistake by putting on an AFE air kit. It costed me mileage and made my regens more frequent and in my opinion allowed to much air in causing a lot of bad performance. I have talked to Ford and have had my truck in the shop numerous times. I have even sent e-mails directly to Ford about regen.
On my semi trucks there are 3 stages of regen. First it does it on its own but gives you an idiot light telling you it is in regen....Second there is a switch on the dash allowing you to do a manual regen based on hours on the engine or poor performance.....Third the shop has a manual regen whereby you can hook to a laptop and monitor all aspects of the regen ensuring a clean and complete burn of the departiculate filtre. I explained this to Ford and also told them of the poor mileage. They actually commented this was normal! I also mentioned to them that when my truck goes into regen it can throw a false check engine light and runs like a piece o ch!t! It smells bad sputters and coughs and basically makes you think your walking...again which Ford tells me is normal!!
So just the other day I get a letter from Ford saying "your vehicle may exhibit driveability concerns,including elevated idle, minor cruise control speed fluctuations, poor shifting with automatics and a false check engine indicator light. In addition some customers would like to know when there vehicle is in regen." So what they are going to do is add some more info to be displayed on the message centre.
This will include a warm up time where you will have no pedal movement for 30 seconds allowing engine to warm up. It will also include a "drive to clean exhaust filtre "message, whereby the operator isn't driving the vehicle properly Ford says, not allowing regen so when this is displayed they want you to drive 30mph + min for 20 min to clean DPF. When done it will tell you it is back to normal. If ignored they will have a reduced power message and if the engine control module can't clean it then your check engine light will come on and reduce power even further. Then you will have to take to the shop where now they can do a manual regen.
Sooo I guess I will see what changes will occur if I can ever get my truck into the shop! The waits are long and don't seem to be getting any better. They tell me it is due to lack of techs. I say get some more....maybe with the economy slowing down some more deisel techs will come about.
For now all I know is I get poor mileage whether I use Howes fuel conditioner or not....... I get 400 - 500 km per tank now that I took the AFE off.......... I used to get 300-400km with it on.......I have talked to all kinds of deisel shops about chips and most are not proving results, not to mention screwing with your warranty! In my opinion the federal government shouldn't have imposed the same emission standards on small deisels as they have done on commercial trucks. As I said the dealers don't have the techs and the engine manufacturers didn't have a clue what they were doing! Oh well I had a customer once say to me..."you drive a one ton 4x4 deisel and you expect fuel mileage?"
So enjoy the truck as it is awesome! It is made to work and you can do it in comfort and style!! You will just need to make a deal with Murray to start hauling fuel in those tankers and the military for a fuel on the go system that they use to refuel ther jets!
I made my first mistake by putting on an AFE air kit. It costed me mileage and made my regens more frequent and in my opinion allowed to much air in causing a lot of bad performance. I have talked to Ford and have had my truck in the shop numerous times. I have even sent e-mails directly to Ford about regen.
On my semi trucks there are 3 stages of regen. First it does it on its own but gives you an idiot light telling you it is in regen....Second there is a switch on the dash allowing you to do a manual regen based on hours on the engine or poor performance.....Third the shop has a manual regen whereby you can hook to a laptop and monitor all aspects of the regen ensuring a clean and complete burn of the departiculate filtre. I explained this to Ford and also told them of the poor mileage. They actually commented this was normal! I also mentioned to them that when my truck goes into regen it can throw a false check engine light and runs like a piece o ch!t! It smells bad sputters and coughs and basically makes you think your walking...again which Ford tells me is normal!!
So just the other day I get a letter from Ford saying "your vehicle may exhibit driveability concerns,including elevated idle, minor cruise control speed fluctuations, poor shifting with automatics and a false check engine indicator light. In addition some customers would like to know when there vehicle is in regen." So what they are going to do is add some more info to be displayed on the message centre.
This will include a warm up time where you will have no pedal movement for 30 seconds allowing engine to warm up. It will also include a "drive to clean exhaust filtre "message, whereby the operator isn't driving the vehicle properly Ford says, not allowing regen so when this is displayed they want you to drive 30mph + min for 20 min to clean DPF. When done it will tell you it is back to normal. If ignored they will have a reduced power message and if the engine control module can't clean it then your check engine light will come on and reduce power even further. Then you will have to take to the shop where now they can do a manual regen.
Sooo I guess I will see what changes will occur if I can ever get my truck into the shop! The waits are long and don't seem to be getting any better. They tell me it is due to lack of techs. I say get some more....maybe with the economy slowing down some more deisel techs will come about.
For now all I know is I get poor mileage whether I use Howes fuel conditioner or not....... I get 400 - 500 km per tank now that I took the AFE off.......... I used to get 300-400km with it on.......I have talked to all kinds of deisel shops about chips and most are not proving results, not to mention screwing with your warranty! In my opinion the federal government shouldn't have imposed the same emission standards on small deisels as they have done on commercial trucks. As I said the dealers don't have the techs and the engine manufacturers didn't have a clue what they were doing! Oh well I had a customer once say to me..."you drive a one ton 4x4 deisel and you expect fuel mileage?"
So enjoy the truck as it is awesome! It is made to work and you can do it in comfort and style!! You will just need to make a deal with Murray to start hauling fuel in those tankers and the military for a fuel on the go system that they use to refuel ther jets!
