Have towed or driven Class C MH for years, now have 2014 F150 Ecoboost. Pulls great.

Question: while towing up long incline, engine got hot, shot message through dash saying truck would shift gears to ovoid overheating. I have read I should lock out 5 and 6 on slow steady climbs. If I am in tow mode and want to downshift, how do I do that? I know I can shift entire thing to 2nd gear - but I assume that is not what we are talking about here. On this particular climb it was hot (100 out) and I was blocked in left lane going slower than I would have liked. RPMs were low.

Detailed description of process would be great.

I also regularly use Tow/Haul. Sometimes on decline I will downshift to 2nd or 1st and not use brakes at all going down. Thoughts?

 

You should be able to pull the shifter to 'M' on the console/dash. Then, use the + or - buttons on the shifter to manually hold the transmission in a specific gear. This acts much like a manual transmission type shift pattern where the computer will only force a shift when at the limits of the RPM range (ie. downshifting when the truck speed is too slow to maintain that gear and running to the rev limiter as RPMs increase).

If you're in 'D' you should see the gear numbers either along the bottom of the center gauge area (on my STX work truck) or along the right hand side of the center LCD screen (my FX4). If you don't see any gear indication lit up, hit the + button once on the shifter and you should see it. Now, you can hit the - button once to remove 6th gear from the shift scheme. The transmission will act normally by up and down shifting as you drive, but you've locked out 6th gear. Hitting the - button again will lock out 5th gear so only 1 through 4 are available and so on.

 

Yes... I can hit + and six gear show up. I can lock one out by hitting minus. I can shift to M and put it in a gear. So when going up hill, in D if i find trans is getting hot and RPM are too low, what is best way to downshift. I read press accelerator all the way to floor. WIll that work?

 

Are you serious?

 

I take it that was a stupid question?

 

Well......

Do you understand the difference between using the +/- rocker switch in "Drive" versus "Manual" mode? Not sure if that is where you are hung up.

 

The best way is whichever you prefer. I don't think downshifting is going to lower the temperatures on much of anything, but regardless of how you do it, you won't hurt the transmission.

I've always found the lowest temperatures to occur when you're in the highest gear possible. I haven't towed much long distance with an EcoBoost truck, so that may be a little different for this engine.

 

the owner's manual here is going to be your friend. but, in short, you can force a downshift several ways.

if you have a towing package then the truck comes with a feature called "select shift" this refers to the +/- rocker on the gear selector, and the "M" position on the gear indicator.

Select shift has two modes: manual shift and progressive shift (i'm paraphrasing).

in manual shift mode, with the gear selector in "M" the transmission will be locked into whatever gear the truck is currently in when you shift it into "M" and will not shift out of that gear until you press the rocker up(+) or down(-). the gear you are in will be displayed on your dash.

in progressive shift mode it will shift up and down normally, but you can lock out the upper gears (all the way down to first, iirc). to activate the progressive shift feature simply press the rocker up or down (+/-) while the gear indicator is in "D". this will illuminate a gear display on your cluster with the current gear being highlighted. to lock out gears, press the rocker down and you will see the gears progressively disappear from your display indicating that gear will no longer be used.

you can utilize either of these methods at any time to force the truck to downshift, if you feel the need to do so.

then there's the good'ole "forced downshift" by pressing the accelerator pedal to the floor. this will almost always cause the truck to downshift, but will likely cause an upshift when you let off, effectively not solving the problem you are trying to solve.

something else of note is that the transmission will respond differently to the vigor with which you press or release the accelerator, particularly in tow/haul mode. that is to say a slow squeeze on the skinny pedal is less likely to cause a downshift, whereas pressing it quickly will usually cause it to downshift, even though you pressed it the same amount. Likewise, the rate at which you lift will change the way the truck shifts as well. a slow lift will usually cause an upshift, but if you snap off the throttle it will usually hold the current gear to help you slow down (particularly in tow/haul).

as i said, this is all paraphrased from the owner's guide, but it would probably be a good idea to read through some of it if you get time. these trucks do so much more than the trucks even 10 years ago. the Powertrain Control Module controls both engine and transmission functions and utilizes them very much together as a tool to help the truck do what the driver is requesting.

hopefully that helps a little, though.

since that is what the truck did on it's own, it must work

makes some sense to me. downshifting will increase engine speed which will increase coolant flow. particularly running at high boost, more coolant flow would seem advantageous, within reason, that is -- which is exactly what the truck did without being told to do so.

 

Did it? Just reread the OP's posts and I don't see where he said it started holding lower gears once it started getting hot. I've never known these trucks to do this; I had my '13 as warm as 243 degrees and it still went for the highest gear possible.

Sure, I get that side of it. But it would also generate lots more heat at those high RPMs. Not saying it wouldn't work like that, but I've never seen or heard of a truck downshifting to cool down. Learn something new every day though, perhaps I'll be proven wrong.

 

I've thought through this many times while hauling and haven't come up with a good reason to use either "D" or "M." I don't think one is better than the other...unless you don't want your truck to downshift for some reason then you would use "M." Downshifting in either mode should be mutual.

Putting the truck in tow/haul should run the transmission and engine harder, but it should also kick the transmission into a different cooling mode to help with the extra heat.

I personally have never seen an over-heating message on the screen before. That thing must have been working hard!

 

while not stated directly, from the two bold comments below, one infers to read "downshifted to avoid overhead" maybe the OP can add some clarity.

i think it depends on the limits at which you are talking. Like most everything else automotive, i'd feel safe assuming there is a curve for heat production vs. rpm and cooling ability vs. rpm. At some point, your engine speed will be too low to flow enough coolant to keep cool and at some point the engine will be flowing too much coolant whilst creating even more heat due to rpm.

i don't know what that breakover point is, but i bet the PCM does. if i were to guess, i'd say it was in the lower 1/2 of the rpm band, but that's just a gut feeling.

 

If the engine is overheating and lugged down at low rpm then the engine will run cooler by upshifting. It changes the spark advance, water pump speeds up, and more air is flowing through the engine.

Better thing to do is slow down and drop several gears to unload the engine. Make those gears do the work instead of the engine.

Trans cooling system is the same system either way. No magical stuff happening in tow/haul mode.

 

Let me restate myself then.....it assists in shifting less and at different points which aids in transmission cooling. Didn't mean something "magical" occurs.

 

How is there "more air flowing"? The fans are electric. Unless you mean the the alternator is putting out more current causing a slight increase of fan speed. But that's really very slight...

 

i think he's saying that more air is being pumped through the engine, which is true.