Winter Gas MPG/ Towing ?

I’m sure this has been discussed before, but a search gave me nothing. How much of decrease in gas mileage do you guys see in your trucks in the winter? My 97′ f150 is getting around 9 mpg mostly city driving right now. I let it warm up a lot usually when its cold, but that still seems ridiculously low. I realize the gas is also supposed to be different in the winter up here and i read that could decrease your mileage by 10%. I wish I had some comparable gas mileage numbers from the summer but I bought the truck in the fall. When I drove it home for the weekend and did mostly highway driving it still only got like 13.5 mpg. Its making me consider getting rid of it and goin back to a 2wd 4cyl. s10, but the whole reason i bought this truck was so i would be able to pull my boat easier. I would of gotten a v6 ranger or s10, instead of the f150 but lots of guys said the gas mileage would be almost the same and this truck was cheaper than anything else i could find.

On a side note, you think if i switched back to a 4cyl. s10 I would have problems getting my boat out of a landing. I brought this up in another post a while ago, but nobody said much. I know a lot of guys do it, and some guys even use cars, but I also dont want to be the guy who can’t get out of a boat landing. 16.5 ft aluminum boat with a 40 horse and lots of wood flooring/compartments = no idea how much it weighs. I pulled it good enough with my old s10, but only tried getting out of a landing once… and squawked the tires pretty good with the stick shift. I assume an auto trans with the same truck would be a lot easier, but may require a tranny cooler.

Not sure how many miles your F-150 has on it but maybe a good tune-up (plugs, wires, cap and rotor) may help with your mileage. My truck gets an avg. of 18 MPG in the summer, this winter it has dropped to 15-15.5 MPG. This is just an average that is on the on-board outside temp gage/mileage/avg. speed meter. I am sure that letting the truck sit and idle/warm up affects the avg. mileage some but I am not sure how much.

Red,

What engine did you get? I had an 98 Expedition with the 5.4. Not towing I got 15 in the summer and 12/13 during the winter. Towing I only got 9-11 mpg. All depending on my speed and load.

I would also add a new air filter to your list.

FDR

I have a new K&N air filter, brand new motorcraft platinum spark plugs, new plug wires. Its a 4.6 v8, automatic, 4×4.

I really just hate driving it around burning up so much gas, since 99.5% of my driving im not towing anything… seems like a waste of money, just so i can pull my boat easy. My little old s10 was getting 27mpg in the summer atleast, so it sucks to be getting a 3rd to 1/2 of that. I literally would not be able to afford the gas if i had to drive a lot every day, but work is only 5-6 miles away and school is a mile. If i want to make the 180 miles round trip back home its a different story.

If you’re just making short trips around town with it then those numbers don’t really surprise me. I just filled up yesterday and realized that I was getting around 10 with my 98 explorer 5.0. Thats purely driving to and from work in town.

My truck doesn’t really warm up all the way until I get to work, so you’ve gotta figure that its running as inefficiently as its ever going to when its cold like that.

Letting it idle to warm up doesn’t help much either. Those V8’s can slurp down a decent bit of gas if you’re doing that every time you drive it.

As far as highway driving goes, I usually can get 18-20 in the summer, and in the winter it drops off to 16-17.

I bet a v6 ranger would pull that boat no problem. I have a 1650 Fishhawk with a 90hp and a v6 blazer pulled mine decently. It wasn’t great, but it did the job.

I assume your boat is a bit lighter than mine, plus Ive heard that the v6 rangers pull quite a bit better than the blazers do. Who knows, maybe thats the ticket?

I’d probably just keep the F150 for a while if I were in your shoes. I bet your mileage will improve a bit in the summer. If its still pretty bad then maybe its time to switch to a ranger or explorer. My roommate has the 4.0 v6 in his ranger and says he gets 22 highway in the summer. I love my exploder. I usually get around 14 mpg pulling my boat. Plus the 5.0 V8 has plenty of power for what I’m towing. The 18-20 mpg highway isn’t the greatest, but its not too terrible either.

I also have (alot of Fords) a 97 F150 extra cab 4X4 that is my work truck. There is currently 231000 miles on it. The MPG summer HWY is around 18-20 winter 12-13 MPG, towing in the summer 20′ ranger boat 12-15 MPG. I have a V6 ranger extra cab 4×4 – does less MPG than both my 97 and my 2010 F150 4X4 4door W/ 6.5 box. My new 2010 gets about 18 MPG unloaded HWY @65 MPH and 12 MPG winter towing an enclosed snowmobile trailer. All have toppers or covers on the bed. I know I would not be happy trying to tow with a V6 and would not even consider a 2WD in MN.

Leave the boat hooked up to the f150 and find yourself a
cheap commuter car, like a geo metro or similar, to get to
and from school and work.

I have a ’97 Ranger V-6 auto with 4X4, 155,000+ miles. I don’t have a boat but I do have a small stock trailer. I’ve loaded over 1500 pounds of animals (cattle) in that and pulled it fine. Add in the trailer weight and it would be more than any 16 ft boat. I also use it back and forth for work, 13 miles. It gets about 22 in the summer. It has a topper too. If you get a Ranger, look for the Super Cab. You will want the extra room.

Red, two things pop into my head. The size of your truck motor and the size of your boat.

Having a smaller v8 is not always going to get the best milage. I had a 92 f150 with a smaller v8 that was geared for better milage right…… NOT…. I would get 7-10mpg in January on the highway between Grand Forks and Fargo. I then went with a 95 Chevy with the 350 equivalent and my milage went up to 14-16 during January on the same road. Have you ran any diesel gas through it to clean it out. I put in 1 gallon of diesel with a full tank every 3 months. The diesel has all the cleaning agents that you can buy separately but costs a ton less than the additives.

Now the size of your boat. My brother had a 88 Lund 16′ Pike Rebel that he towed with a Chevy Corsica and a Chevy Small Blazer. The Corsica would get mid 20’s and the Blazer would get upper teens for mpg not towing. On a rare occasion he would have a problem with the Corsica at the boat landings but never with the small Blazer. By the sounds of it your boat would be similar with the older Pike Rebels.

If you want just one vehicle maybe look at the smaller SUV’s like the Explorer or Blazers. Good Luck.

Try not letting it warm up – the gas mileage experts say you’re just wasting gas. Idling at 1000 rpm’s uses the same amount of fuel as going 42 mph in overdrive on my SUV. Get an electric engine heater to plug in – it will warm the water/antifreeze so you have instant heat when you start the engine. I use to have mine plugged into the outside light circuit so I could switch it on an hour before I was ready to leave (saved on the electric bill).

I idle my vehicles only long enough to get the oil pressure up. It does not harm the vehicles as the car has 238,000 and the truck 232,000. My guess is you just have the wrong combination of motor and rear end. Some things just don’t seem to work, you might have to do it over with another vehicle.

Couple things that have helped my pickup mileage this winter.

1- Don’t let it warm up as much. I used to let my truck idle 5min or so on the cold days. Now I let it idle for 30sec/1min and just take it easy for the first few miles.

2- Check your tire pressure. It never fails that after a very cold snap my truck seems to loose tire pressure. A few cold snaps and she’s real low. Ensure you’re running to spec there.

3- Not sure how much you’re using 4×4, but my mileage tanks if I’m in 4×4 for any amount of time.

From one small V8 truck owner to another, Hope that helps

Here is some data from my F150 taken last year… I have a ’97 3.8L 2 wheel drive F150, so should get a little better mileage than the 4WD with the larger engines. When we switch to winter gas, the mileage dropped off.

I tried adding the acetone to the gas for three tanks to see whether it would extend the gas mileage as some folks on the internet claimed anywhere from 5-30% improvements, but I saw nothing. Possibly because I was not filling with pure gasoline, but rather with the oxygenated fuels.

My ’09 F150 went from 21 HWY to 17 HWY in the cold.

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Leave the boat hooked up to the f150 and find yourself a
cheap commuter car, like a geo metro or similar, to get to
and from school and work.

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He isn’t driving the vehicle enough to benefit from it. By adding an additional vehicle, you have the cost of the vehicle, insurance, and registration. Add all of that up and you aren’t saving anything in the difference between mpg’s.

change the exhaust to a larger exhaust pipe.. going from 2 3/4 inch to 3 inches increased the mileage on one of my older suburban’s substancially.. by about 3 -4 mpg..

Impalapower is correct
Fuel economy is only 1 factor in ownership. I purchased a full size truck but originally was looking at midsize but the gain was only 2 mpg and the sacafice of the mid size did not warrent the small gain of 2 mpg. My comparison was done when gas was $3.75-4.00 per gallon.
As others have said do not warm up as much because your getting 0 mpg during warm up. Give it 30 secs and take it easy first few miles and you should be fine. I have had cars and trucks with over 200K
Also driving style can make a differance easy acceleration and always look forward for an opportunity to coast makes a huge differance. When highway driving I take the right lane do 5mph under and gain about 2-3 mpg. My computer provides great feedback while driving.
I think many people let the mpg be too much of a factor and do not look at the other cost factors of ownership.
But I would say I lose 1-2 mpg in the winter
Good Luck

Gas is cheaper than car payments.

i dont know for any of you but the way i see it ive owned many trucks small and large some times its luck of the draw buying used you dont always get to pick gear ratios motor size is a little easyer to pick but you need to decide do you want a bigger truck that is going to get worst fuel mileage or a smaller one that will get better mileage but be harder on the drive train. the way i see it i have a 2002 3/4 ton crew cab and it gets as good as my 93 1/2 ton ext. but. I DIDNT PICK A TRUCK FOR FUEL ECO. I picked it for function so you just live with it one way or anotheir maybe you need something more like a outback if your worried.

red89-
I owned a ’97 F150 4×4 Ext cab 5.4L for a number of years. I don’t live in the city, but short trips mileage was around 10mpg. Hwy empty, it was 15mpg, summer. Towing about 12mpg. Winter mileage was less a couple mpg.

It was not an efficient vehicle, and I knew that. That’s why it only left the garage to haul and tow stuff.

I had a Ranger 4×4 4.0L and it pulled my 17′ Alumacraft, but I quickly moved to the F150. IMO, I wouldn’t recommend any 4 cyl vehicle to pull your boat. You may get by with a 6cyl, but I really don’t think the mileage will be a significant difference.

I drive a diesel it is different but in the wionter mine drops a ton 16-20 summer to 11-14 if lucky winter. Unleaded fuel has additive too. also cold air is denser and the coldest days you can expect a large drop in mpg due to dense air. I also try differnt gas stations to find differnt brands off fuel. I notice a 4-5 mpg change between brands try that.

I have a 2002 Chevy Silverado I bought 2 years ago in the fall. After a few months into it I thought I made a mistake. Cold weather and long warm-ups had my mileage at 12 mpg. A friend has the same truck and puts on a lot of miles. After some questioning, he told me that the winter miles are going to be lower due to warm-ups and the fact that fuel burns less efficient during the colder months. I don’t understand the technical portion of that but it made a difference. My summer mileage is around 19-20 mpg. He also said he noticed a substantial difference when burning the 89 octane mixture, as opposed to the 87 octane. In Arcadia, where I buy my fuel, the price is the same so it would be foolish to burn the lower octane fuel. The few pennies difference in the two, in other locations, is probably well worth 2-3 mpg you gain. It made a difference in my truck. Also controlling ones heavy foot makes quite a bit of difference. Whenever possible, and when it is safe, use your cruise control and set it with the flow of traffic. You’d be surprised how much fuel you can save. My truck doesn’t have the fancy fuel consumption read-out that tells the present mpg ratio but my brothers does. There is quite a difference when you exceed 65 mph.

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Leave the boat hooked up to the f150 and find yourself a
cheap commuter car, like a geo metro or similar, to get to
and from school and work.

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He isn’t driving the vehicle enough to benefit from it. By adding an additional vehicle, you have the cost of the vehicle, insurance, and registration. Add all of that up and you aren’t saving anything in the difference between mpg’s.

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Yes, with the amount of miles i put on per year a second vehicle is completely out of the question. Also I would have no where to park it. You guys have basically just confirmed most of the stuff i have been thinking. I will have to quit letting it warm up so much, but i was doing that because it does not shift into overdrive when its cold so its running high rpms going down the highway cause its stuck in 3rd or 4th gear. Nobody said much about the 4cyl. so im gonna assume that it would be a bad idea to switch back as far as pulling my boat out. It just sucks because less than 1% of my driving is towing, so im driving this truck around when there is no point to having a truck for normal driving. I dont care about how much power i have for normal driving, I could get by with a little geo that got 40mpg if it could pull my boat.
I have the truck up on craigslist saying I will trade it, so ill just leave it up and see if anybody would trade me a 4×4 ranger for it. Lots of people have emailed me about coming to look at it and paying cash, but if i sold it i would have to have another vehicle lined up to buy that same day, so thats a tough situation. We used to pull the boat with our mini van, so any truck with a v6 could pull it fine i know.

Anyone here have a truck that doesn’t get 18 mpg in the summer? Seems I read these threads and all the V8 4×4’s mentioned from late 90’s up get 18-20 mpg. I have trouble buying that, except for trucks made in the past few years.

But….maybe people just drive really slow or very easy on the pedal?

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Anyone here have a truck that doesn’t get 18 mpg in the summer? Seems I read these threads and all the V8 4×4’s mentioned from late 90’s up get 18-20 mpg. I have trouble buying that, except for trucks made in the past few years.

But….maybe people just drive really slow or very easy on the pedal?

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I have a 2004 3/4 ton Chevy 4×4 with the 6.0L and the best I can get in the summer empty is 16.5-17mpg. I would love to pick up a couple of mpg’s.

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Nobody said much about the 4cyl. so im gonna assume that it would be a bad idea to switch back as far as pulling my boat out.

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Depending on how much the boat and trailer weighs, rear axle ratio, and auto/manual transmission, you might be able to pull your boat. Just because the tires turned at the landing doesn’t mean that a different truck wouldn’t.

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I have a 2004 3/4 ton Chevy 4×4 with the 6.0L and the best I can get in the summer empty is 16.5-17mpg. I would love to pick up a couple of mpg’s.

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I wouldn’t complain about that mileage, thats pretty good for a 6.0. I had a ’00 6.0 and got 13, then later went to a 8.1 and got 16.

red89,

A 16.5 ft boat with a 40 hp probably doesn’t weigh over 800 pounds (350 lbs for the boat, 150 lbs motor, 150 lbs trailer, 150 lbs fuel and gear). You don’t need to truck to tow that type of boat. I towed around a 16.5 ft Alumacraft Lunker with a 40 hp Honda tiller with a Dodge Intrepid 6 cylinder for several years and thousands of miles and never had a problem. My mileage went from about 27 mpg highway to 15 mpg highway when towing but I had the benefit of good mileage the 95% of the time I wasn’t towing. I checked the towing capacity of a Chevy Impala and it’s listed at 1000 lbs so you should be fine with a sedan. I found one source that listed the towing capacity of a 1996 S10 2.2 liter 4 cylinder at 2000 lbs.

About the only time I could see you having a problem pulling the boat out at the ramp would be if the ramp was icy. I used the previosly mentioned boat dozens of times at Everts for winter fishing and could always get up the ramp (Note: The ramps at Everts are plowed and salted). Ramps that aren’t maintained in the winter will be tougher to use but how ofen do you fish in the winter? Even then, just find a buddy that has 4×4 on those rare occasions.

In summary, you sure don’t need an F150 to tow your small boat. A Chevy S10 should be just fine.

Good Luck,

Boone

Boone, Boone, Boone…. Don’t you know?? You NEED a F-250 diesel to tow a 16′ boat according to many people on these boards

Seriously, that is one of the most logical posts I’ve seen, here’s to you.

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red89,

A 16.5 ft boat with a 40 hp probably doesn’t weigh over 800 pounds (350 lbs for the boat, 150 lbs motor, 150 lbs trailer, 150 lbs fuel and gear). You don’t need to truck to tow that type of boat. I towed around a 16.5 ft Alumacraft Lunker with a 40 hp Honda tiller with a Dodge Intrepid 6 cylinder for several years and thousands of miles and never had a problem. I found one source that listed the towing capacity of a 1996 S10 2.2 liter 4 cylinder at 2000 lbs.

About the only time I could see you having a problem pulling the boat out at the ramp would be if the ramp was icy. I used the previosly mentioned boat dozens of times at Everts for winter fishing and could always get up the ramp (Note: The ramps at Everts are plowed and salted). Ramps that aren’t maintained in the winter will be tougher to use but how ofen do you fish in the winter? Even then, just find a buddy that has 4×4 on those rare occasions.

In summary, you sure don’t need an F150 to tow your small boat. A Chevy S10 should be just fine.

Good Luck,

Boone

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You really think my rig only weighs 800 lbs.?? I figured the boat had to weigh a lot more than that because of all the wood flooring in it. Plus two batteries and its a console drive. I figured it has to be over 1000 lbs.
yes you are correct I could pull the boat with my s10, cause i did! Gotta read this stuff more. Yes, the s10 specs you have are correct, even for the 4cyl.
I would never be comfortable pulling the boat a long ways to go fishing though. I’m sure my brakes would be shot pretty quick cause the boat will push that s10 quit a bit. But I probably would just stick to fishing around winona, so I thought I might be able to get by with switching back to a 4 cyl s10. I figure an automatic transmission s10 would be easier also for getting out of landings without rolling back and having to drop and burn the clutch. My main concern though is getting that little truck to pull out of a gravel boat landing.
When we go on fishing trips and stuff like that, we take my dads boat and truck anyway, so basically I just have his smaller boat down here so i can fish while im at school.