I have had 2 Chevy 3500HD DRW flatbed work trucks, both bought new. The first one bought in Feb of 2013 had 156k on it when it took an unfortunate detour through the ditch and into the woods. Never anything but routine maintenance and it still had the original brake pads on it a the time of its demise. We replaced it with another 3500 work truck w/ flatbed and it has about 50k on the odometer in 11 months. Problem free and pulls like a freight train. We get between 11-12 MPG pulling a 24'gooseneck (avg cargo wt 5-8k) and 15-16 without trailer. I bought a '17 SD 250 Lariat in November and finally pulled a couple of loads after I got 2500 miles on it. Seat of the pants observations are the P/S has a good bit more power than the D-Max and gets better fuel mileage (about 1mpg loaded and 3-4 empty). I live in Florida so there's not many hills around here to make that comparison. It's really not apples to apples comparing a Lariat to a work truck, but the Ford seems to be of higher quality and fit & finish than the Chevy. The exhaust brake on the Chevy seems to be stronger and the brakes seem a bit stouter too. This may be the difference between a 3500 drw and a 250 srw. These new Fords are awesome and I am sure my next work truck will be an F-450 flatbed. Just my .02.

 

Bowtie,

The 250 has vac assist brakes; the DRW Fords have hydroboost brakes. The GM HD trucks all have hydroboost brakes, even the gas models. The F-450 Ford has larger brakes than all other Super Duty models lower than it in designation.

 

Is it an all new or is it based upon the original DMax with product improvements and a larger engine or is it new like the CGI Ford 6.7?

I remember years ago when GM was showing the engine and had it on display at the Texas State Fair. They had some Techs there and I spent a good deal of time talking with them and was quite impressed with what they had to say and it appears that it was indeed a great engine and unless things have changed its also the engine that is sold around the world by GM and ISUZU. If still the case then this could be of benefit due to parts availability...

 

Might as well call it "all new" with the majority of the rotating assembly and heads being updated or upgraded over the LML. About the only thing it retained was the displacement.

 

It pretty much is "all new" but also the layout remains the same. Air-to-air intercooler, outboard exhaust manifolds, inboard air intake.

 

For those who haven't seen this, go to about 15:15 for the engineer chat about the new Duramax. Pretty interesting stuff and goes into what is "carry over" and what's new.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtXjEy5hkwA

Below is a new DMax cold starting at -10. I've heard a 2016 Cummins start better at -35. Haven't heard a new Powerstroke do that cold of a start. Any engine starting at -10 is a glorious thing, but compared to the Cummins, color me not that impressed with the DMax, in this instance at least.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xNgzlevn00

 

Ouch! Something doesn't seem right there. I haven't heard a sub-zero cold start that hard in a Ford since my '99 7.3. Maybe it's just that particular truck??

 

Could be. Hard to blame it on a bad battery (well, I guess you still can) as those things have barely been on dealers' lots for a month yet.

 

Holy crap, that truck was having waaayyy to hard antime starting at only -10F! I agree, something doesn't seem right. My 2017 started this year at -10 no problem.

 

That was bad, lots of missing and thumping. My 6.4 sounded better than that and started easier.


6.7 is way better as well.


If I was that dealer i'd take that video down, they won't see that.

 

I agree 100% with you about warranty support.My neigbor has a 2016 D-max and the CP-4 let go at 21K miles.GM had that truck fixed in four days no questions asked!No way Ford would have done that.They do fix some but its like pulling teeth to get them to do it.

I also agree with what someone else said,Ford got their azz handed to them on the 6.0 and their now trying to keep every penny in their pocket they can.

 

I forwarded that video to a friend who is into racing diesel trucks. Here was his response.


"I have my doubts about anything GM does on their diesel trucks, including this new one. I have a good friend in Kentucky that bought a 2016 LOADED OUT Duramax and he had nothing but trouble with that truck!! It was SO BAD that GM took that 2016 truck back with about 3,000 miles and gave him a brand new one, but NOT like the one in this video. He told me that the 2016 had oil and tranny leaks which they never got fixed! He also said the truck ran hot all the time.
He said he was seeing oil temps between 205-208 all the time and coolant temps near the same. He also said that GM did that "air induction" on the hood to try and get those high temperatures down!"


That was my experience with the GM as well. Hard to keep cool. Ford has always over engineered the cooling systems on their trucks.

 

I read a lot of post sin this thread talking about ford denying warranty coverage so I wanted to chime in. My dad has 2012 F250 KR 6.7. At 62,000 miles the fuel pump in the tank grenaded and contaminated the entire fuel system with metal shavings. He did not buy an extended warranty and was out of factory warranty at 60k. The technician diagnosed the truck and said the entire fuel system and all injectors needed to be replaced to the tune of 15k. But then he said that the truck had no evidence of water in the diesel and that my dad had always serviced his truck regularly at that dealer. He said it was not right that the fuel pump fell apart this early in the trucks life and that he would put in a special request to ford to cover the repair. They came back a day later and agreed to cover the entire cost of the repair. He had the truck back in 3 days with an entirely new fuel system from tank to injectors. Ford covered the entire repair. We where floored. The technician and ford went above and beyond for the customer. My dad is no one special, he did not buy a bunch of trucks or anything he is just a regular guy with a truck, and they had no incentive to do that for him. It was one of the major reasons I bought 2017 superduty. I will be buying a warranty. You just see so many posts about Ford service sucking that I thought I would post ourexperience of the opposite.

 

Thank you for posting a positive experience!

Glad they got your dad back on the road.👍

 

Yes, I bought warranty and service to go with it too. I have never had a bad experience with Ford warranty, though that is because of the three new trucks, not one warranty repair was required. That's in 175k on the 2000, 220k on the 2005 6.0, and 3000k Km on the 2017.

Buy buying warranty and service record keeping is not an issue and there can be no quibbling, I don't even put DEF in it. Normally I would never do this but it's getting harder and harder for me to have the time to do service, and there is little I can do.