I thought it was illegal to own and drive an excursion in California?

 

When talking about the 2V V-10 and any type of heavy towing you really need to speak specifically as which gear the 6.8 has, the difference between the two factory offered gear ratios is very significant. I truly believe that nearly all of the historical disrespect that the 6.8 has gotten in regards to it's towing ability is due to people pulling with the 3.73 gear sets. Unfortunately, once they suffer through that experience they have their opinion set and no amount of feedback from those who have done the heavy work with the deeper gears will sway them , they know it sucks because they tried it and it was in fact terrible and they aint going back!
I was so bummed out when the truck meets in OH where the host held the steep grade tow tests each year fizzled out, I was going to go when my work schedule and the yearly meet finally matched up, I still have my stock sized tires so I could have made a run up the hill with that 15K dump trailer with both the 4.39 and 4.88 ratios to see how it compared to the other rigs with various power combos.

 

I think there were 3 gear ratios offered, right?
3.73, 4.10, and 4.30

 

The results from those few years they did those real world tests (especially when that one neighbor wanted to play with his Cummins and blew his engine) really surprised me. I was more surprised at how well the V10's did against the customized 7.3's.

The V10 power plant is no slouch. It gets it done. It's just my preference to how the power comes on that makes me not want one.

Stewart

 

It's my understanding that the V-10 came standard with the 3.73 and the only factory optional ratio was the 4.30. The 5.4s were available with the 4.10, not sure if that was only with 4X4 or not.

 

Yeah that makes sense, that was almost 20 years ago and technology has changed a lot since then. I remember I did test drive a 7.3 dually a few years ago as a potential replacement for my Cummins and was sorely disappointed. Of course, my Cummins was modded and a manual, so an stock auto 7.3 was bound to disappoint. I can see how it wouldn't pull much better than a V10 in stock form. However, who leaves diesels stock??
A couple buddy's have 6.7s, they're out of control with how they run, and QUIET! As I've gotten older, I've grown to appreciate a quiet running engine. A diesel that idles like a gasser is pretty cool IMO.

 

It has been asked and no answer .
what would be a good gear for a 6.8 with manual 5 speed and 35" tires .
4.88 still or a bit lower? Like 5.00 something ?

 

 

Your OD ratio is the same or very close to our autos at .71 so the 4.88s will give you an effective 4.30 ratio with the 35" tires. That is the combination I use (35" + 4.88s). You can go deeper and it will pull even stronger, I ran 4.88s with 32" tires for a while, but the highway mileage will start to be negatively affected by the deeper gears, the effective 4.30 ratio doesn't hit the MPGs too bad.