I disagree. Unfortunately, it does not give much detail in the manual, but what it says is "DTE calculation (distance to empty)". That, to me, just means which history is used for the calculation, not that you need to manually switch that setting to establish a certain history. The computer knows when a trailer is attached. I believe the 500 mile history much more.

 

I see your point and it seems logical. We're both making assumptions. Maybe if you have a little time you can run a search for how it works and let us know what you learn? Thanks.

 

The 500 miles isn't 500 towing or 500 empty it's the last 500 miles you have driven...no differentiation between them.

 

Boy's and their toys.

I just fly by the seat of my pants, and odo, fuel guage! LOL.

I know my fuel guage goes down faster when I tow, and when I'm not towing, it doesn't go down as fast.

Good luck on Your recalibration!

 

It does not do it auto because when you hook up a trailer with no breaks and only using a flat 4 plug, the truck has no idea it is towing. That is why you have to do it each time.

 

That makes no sense to me, since I am not using a trailer with no brakes, and I am not using a flat 4 pin plug either - so why would it not do it right since the system has all the information that is needed. It accurately reports out how many miles the truck has been towing.
I also still do not believe that changing the DTE setting will impact the accuracy of the history stored - as according to the manual all that is being changed is the "calculation method" for the DTE number. Therefore I don't think there is a need to change the setting every time to establish an accurate history. If it was, then this would be even more of a flaw.

Hey, this really is not a big deal, it just seems to be a sloppy implementation. As an electrical engineer, I can see how easy it would be to do this right, and report numbers that make sense. Maybe we are all missing something - but if that is the case, then the manual is incomplete or even inaccurate.

 

flixden,
I can see both sides to this. Your point is it should automatically calculate using the numbers from every time you have towed. I believe the others are correct though, that you have to manually set it to "flag" those miles as towing to be used in the future DTE calcs. The advantage of that would be for people who tow many weights and some empty trailers. They would only set it for "towing" when towing close to their normal max or heavy loads. Those are the ones that affect it the most and would give you the most accurate history to use each time (when hauling heavy). The best option would be several tow settings (light, med, heavy) and would give the most acccurate DTE figures. Or let the truck figure how heavy the tow is and figure accordingly.

 

Your right, they should have only thought about you and they way you would be ising the truck when Ford was designing their truck and what features are on it.. Don't worry about how someone else would connect their trailer to it. These truck are made for everyone to use and are versital in what features get used and how they are used per individual.

 

someone correct me if i'm wrong ... but it seems to me that i read somewhere that the DTE for towing and not towing was directly linked to the tow/haul function.

so if you were towing with the tow/haul "off" it would assume "not towing" and would screw up your DTE algorithims.

maybe i made it up ... but i SWEAR i read that somwhere ....

 

I don't think you understood what I have said.
If they can't distinguish if somebody with a 4 pin plug is towing, then why disable the correct history for everybody?
Maybe I misunderstand you, Kevin, but it does not make much sense to me what you are saying. I am very sure also that most people tow with a 7 connector plug.
So because you (or somebody else) does not have a 12V accessory, none of the 12V accessories in any truck should work? If they would have enabled correct mpg calculations for people with a 7 way plug connector (most people), that would have had no negative effect on those few towing with a 4 pin connector, they just would not have that feature.

 

Ford8502, there actually are different tow settings already, and the computer could automatically calculate a mpg value for each if they would have done it this way. You can add and name your own trailer profiles, and if you'd wish, you could have "travel trailer", "utility trailer", etc. Or even "heavy", "medium", "light". Before each tow, the screen pops up telling you a trailer is connected, and you can pick which one. It's called "active trailer", and you can have multiple. So that's already there, Ford just doesn't calculate a separate fuel consumption for each, as far as I can see.

I am not sure how to manually set it and tell the truck I want towing fuel consumption to be stored, it may still do that automatically, don't know. The DTE setting, according to the manual, only changes how DTE is calculated, and not how fuel consumption is stored or recorded. It would be great to find out though how it really works - I think we are all guessing. Next time I am towing (this coming weekend), I will set it to DTE and see what happens.

 

That would be interesting to try out. I was in tow/haul mode though when I towed.

It looks like I am not the only one who is puzzled about this :
https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...culations.html
http://www.f150forum.com/f38/dte-cal...oblems-138468/

And here is one more, so I am not alone. This guy sees the same weird behavior I do: that with "towing history" used, my DTE gets higher, LOL:
http://www.f150forum.com/f38/dte-cal...ystery-107892/

I do think that this feature is somewhat messed up once towing gets into the equation.

 

The tow/haul mode does not change anything except the way the transmission works and shifts. I do have a utility trailer with a flat 4 plug, so does that mean I should not be able to use this feature. There is nothing on the trailer that requires 12V from the truck. So this way I am still able to calculate DTE while towing even though it is not my TT. From how I understand it works it takes the last 500 miles and uses that for the DTE. The normal mode and towing mode are kept separate. So if you have never used it before you will get the standard calculations in towing mode until you put some miles on it in tow. There are a lot of utility trailers that still use the flat 4 plug, so it makes sense to allow the user to pick which mode they want to use for DTE.

 

i did read in the manual that if the battery is disconnected that the DTE calculations will reset back to a pre loaded default set by ford.

perhaps, in order to get back to square, it might be quicker to reset it back to the default and let the truck relearn.

i guess the one thing to take away from this thread for sure is that if you like to use the DTE display, you had better make sure you switch from "towing" to "normal" depending on what you are doing with the truck.

as far as it being tied into the tow/haul mode, i must have dreamed it because i could not find any reference to it in the manual what-so-ever.

since this is directed at ford (somewhat) .... why not as the driver which trailer he is towing when you depress the tow/haul? one would think that if the driver presses the tow/haul, that he is either towing or hauling.

then, based on which trailer you are towing, it could calculate a more accurate DTE for each individual trailer. This would be UBER handy for a guy like me who might tow any one of 5 trailers. the boat pulls different than the utility trailer which pulls different than the horse trailer, which is different than the car trailer...... since you can name each trailer, and remember trailer brake settings for each, why not store a DTE algorithm for each? while we are at it, lets have one for "hauling" too, since it is labled "tow/haul"

are you reading, ford?

this falls under the same category as "neutral tow" and an elocker that works in 2wd ... both no-brainers that took about 3 model years to ford to come out with.....

its late .... sorry ... but seriously, why are these things so easy for me to see and yet it takes them forever to figgure it out and get it on the market?

 

I switched from "normal" to "towing" history on the last trip, and everything is as messed up as not switching both while towing and after disconnecting the trailer. Not sure, really, how this DTE thing works.