After a wonderful weekend in Steamboat we were returning to Denver. Coming up one of the steeper areas I had this "issue".
65 Mph, 4th gear approx 3k rpm. Pedal on the floor. Slowly losing speed. Boost gauge never went past 50%, approx 20 psi.
Dealer said it was because the last regen did not complete and charged me to do a manual regen.
I have not picked the truck up yet to see if that made any difference.
He said they don't have any hills around and do not have a trailer so they could not duplicate the symptom.

My question is- What amounts of boost are you guys seeing when pulling hard?
Trailer is a 42' Fiver approx 16k.
Oh, yeah. 2017 F350 dually, 4.10 gears.
Seems to me if 20 psi is max they would have calibrated the gauge to show the same, therefore I should be able to show at least 75% when full boost?
Everything is stock. New(er) air filter, nice and clean. Newer fuel filters.

Thanks for your input.
Other than that no troubles except the damn traffic!

 

ive never had a hill where the truck didn't wanna hit 80--90 when i floored it. Even this weekend i delivered a pallet of flooring to a cabin up in the mountains and the truck had zero issues accelerating up the hills. It was enough weigh in the bed to where it was on the bump stops lol.

Did you try to manually shift down to 3rd and see if that'd help?



Oh, i see now, 16k weight. well i mean, that'll prolly do it. Might wanna try to manually shift it to third and see what it does then. Stock aren't these only hitting 26psi peak boost? My XLT gauge doesn't go all the way to the right when i get on the gas pedal. I think max boost it gets maybe to 3/4? i'm not too sure i usually watch the speedo hit 80 before i get on the freeway lol.

 

I can't say I've ever seen the boost gauge ever past 50% when towing. And we've gone up over 9900 ft and up some 8.5% grades. The only "issue" I've ever had was the auxillary fan will kick on. It makes a ton of noise. The first few times that happened, it caused me to worry a bit. But nothing ever changed as far as performance goes. And we've pulled a LOT of hills - Donner Pass (many times), Roger's Pass in British Columbia, the Cascades in Washington, Dixie National Park, a bunch of hills in Utah, etc.

 

LariatBob, I've probably been on the same hills as you were. I've had no problem pulling them. But my trailer is only 11K.

I can't tell that a regen is taking place, based on performance alone. So, I'm not buying the dealer's excuse.

What were your temperatures? Engine oil, coolant and transmission.

 

Driven plenty in hills, mountains etc and I am a LEFT LANE driver, my 5th wheel weighs about 12k and I can run any speed I want.

I will say this, albeit never occurred on my diesel Superdutys, but its the ECM that is calling the shots and if you are losing power at altitude then the ECM is not being told the air is thin and it needs to readjust. The fix is to do a hard reboot on the ECM forcing it into learning mode. I have never had to do this on a Superduty, but I have done it plenty of times on other cars.

I have no idea of the procedure Ford uses, but generally speaking, you disconnect the positive cable and touch it to the still connected Negative cable, this clears the adaptive memory and removes any latent charges in your electrical system and forces the ECM to work off the embedded tables and learn mode usually for about the first 50 restarts.

This was SOP went I went from Texas up into the mountains of Nv, Ut, Co etc. Loss of power, poor mpg went you hit the mountains is not rare and I have done it on cars and on other folks cars. As I went freq it became normal SOP to just do it when I arrived.

I would ask to do a reset on that ECM...in my mind I am not seeing the linkage to the regen, this is exactly how a lot of cars reacted going for low to high altitudes. Today's ECM's are a lot better and there are more senors to trigger the ECM to adapt to the changes. THis may or may not be the issue??

 

How about checking the simple things? Is the air filter clean?

 

24 PSI max at sea level. I'd ask for a refund - charging a truck under warranty for a manual regen??? Crazy IMO.

I lose speed slowly in 5th gear at 65 MPH with a GVW of 26k on 6.5% grades with my 2017 F450. That is around 2000' above sea level.

 

I know the hills between Steamboat and Denver somewhat well and given Sunday afternoon was hotter than Satan's ***** I'm going to guess you had factory back down due to high EGT's. I have a theory that they have factory tuning that will exceed the safe limit's of EGT especially in 4th gear, then they use all of the temp monitors to back it off when that happens. Slower speeds, heat soaked engine, high water, trans and oil temps all begin to lead to heat soak and once that happens it's all down hill.

I tow a 12,000# + trailer from the West Slope to the east Slope 6-8 times per year and have honestly been disappointed with the trucks performance on Vail and Eisenhower. Outside temps haven't seemed to be much factor but given the wall the truck seemed to hit I have to assume that in 4th gear it hammers the EGT's through the roof and the computer see's that and de-fuels. Truck would pull between 60 and 65 MPH on Vail in the canyon section going East bound. At the top of Eisenhower the truck would lay down and 60ish was max speed.

I recently had a few parts go missing from the exhaust and engine bay, what I found with my typical load this weekend going East was that the EGT's stayed very normal and good in 5th and 6th gear, but when I hammered it in the canyon section on Vail Pass it down shifted to 4th and before I could think about it the EGT's spiked to 1540+, it took a lot of backing out of it to keep them under 1300. It was wanting to run and accelerate in 4th beyond the 60-65 MPH range but I was driving purely off the EGT's and keeping them around 1300 limited me to near 65 but slowly gaining speed, then as soon as the grade lessened it really wanted to run. Boost stayed at or near 25# I think it may have spiked higher a time or two but not much. The factory sweep gauge never appeared to go past half way but I was using the EZLynk to monitor boost, top of Eisenhower was somewhat better than before but not shockingly. I'm going to try some different tunes and maybe if I'm still not satisfied work with the tuner to perfect some higher alt. tuning.

I honestly doubt you had anything wrong, but if you did a manual regen may have fixed it, could be plugging fuel filters, could be air filter being somewhat plugged and restricting. I see you think those are newer and clean but filters are an easy check. Like I said though I bet $$ that you were just on that edge and it backed down (de-fueled) to keep safe.

 

Those grades up I 70 I can only pull at 55 mph full throttle with 16K. Don't pay for something you didn't need.

 

hahaha kinda like how i lost all my guns in a tragic boating accident huh

 

All temps were warm but within normal operating ranges.
Might just be adjusting to the new fiver. Old travel trailer was much lighter and pulled the hills with no problems.
The main thing I am questioning is what is "normal" max boost for these trucks?
Thanks everyone for your feedback.

 

24PSI. You'll never see it much past half on the boost gauge. 55 sounds right on rabbit ears pass.
Get your momentum up early, shift early, keep your RPMs at 2800 RPM to keep you at Max hp and egts low. Hold the throttle to the floor and let it go.

BTW - the temp gauge doesn't even begin to move until 240+F. Not a problem - it's designed to do it, but yeah....250 EOT is where you start to see/feel the engine throttle back - fan will be screaming. We tow a 16k 5th wheel in the Rockies.

I wouldn't pay the dealer a dime. He's milking you.

 

I also lost some parts. Maybe a six pack crew out there pulling parts at the dinners.

Before all that when the truck was stock, the highest my boost gauge would read was 21-22psi. Just a tad over half on the gauge.

Maybe it was in a regen while pulling the grade. Having a regen happen while pulling 16K up a very steep grade in extreme heat could cause a little loss of power. Too high EGT from regen and heavy throttle demand pulling grade may cause the ECM to back something down for protection.

For sure would not pay a dime for a regen the truck is supposed to be able to take of on its own.
Would be like paying for the service center to stick the key in the ignition & start the engine for you.

as others have said, check the air filter & fuel filters.

 

A few weeks ago I took a new Deere skidsteer, bucket, posthole digger and pallet forks to Colorado on my 21' PJ gooseneck trailer.- about 14k lbs. Going over Raton Pass I locked out 5th and 6th gears and on the really steep declines locked out 4th. I mainly did this to keep the coolant temp lower as well as for the engine braking. Of course tow haul was on and the exhaust brake was on.
I was disappointed with the power. I didn't have any trouble keeping up my speed but I didn't have much left. I tried to pass a few times (on a 4 lane road) and with the pedal to the floor it didn't have much left. In other words if I was doing 55 or 60 and trying to pass it was already so close to WOT their was no power left for passing.

Truck has 3.55 rear and 20's so effectively a 3.31 rear end

Last year we took our fiver up there. It weighs about 9500 lbs. It was a whole lot more enjoyable experience..I think if I towed in the mountains much I would want a 3.73 or 4.10

I think the OP's truck either needs new fuel filter or it defueled and he missed the warning message. Get an Edge Insight CTS2 so you can see "real" numbers for oil, coolant, boost, and EGT's. Ford's gauges are about worthless

 

So can you all see a icon on your gauge cluster when a Regen occurres? I have not seen one but can smell it when it happens.