Just wanted to say thanks to all the great info I'm finding on the site.

I am the proud owner of a 2005 Ext. Cab - Short Box - V-10. I have a few questions - I have owned many trucks over the years but have only had gas engines for about a year. I have only ran diesel pickups and dumps for my business. Until now. I usually end up trading off my trucks when the repairs cost too much... I just turned 5,500 miles on my V-10 after returning from a trip to Nebraska. I thought going on a trip of 900 miles would break in the engine. It has the 4.10 ratio. Lets just say I won't be doing any more traveling with the V-10 anymore... Is 9-10 Mpg about right? There is no way I get more than 10 miles to the gallon. My 2005 F-150 averages about 17-18 Mpg and my 2003 6.0 Psd gets about 9-10 empty but it also weighs 11,500 lbs. I sold my 1995 Ext. Cab F-250 Psd to buy the V-10. The repairs on the 95 were killing me but @ 175,000 miles of using it - I'm not surprised. I love the power of the V-10 pulling a skid loader around town but it sure likes to downshift and run high RPM's on the highway. Is 10 Mpg what I should expect out of a V-10. My 95 Psd averaged 20 Mpg with no cat or muffler and computer reprogramed. I bought the V-10 because it wasn't a diesel and I didn't want the high cost of maintanence. I also figured I would have very few issues under the 150,000 mile mark. I absolutely love the truck but the Mpg situation and steering vaugness make me wonder. What do you guys think of the new coilover front suspension? I'm not very fond of it.

If you are a V-10 owner - Would you buy a V-10 again??? Make me feel better...

 

The V-10 is definitely a good engine....I loved mine. I towed a 9500# fifth wheel about 12,000 miles last year and averaged about 8 MPG while towing and about 14-16 empty. The first thing you should do is get a full bed cover for the top of the bed. This made about 3 MPG difference for me. I did use 93 octane for towing and definitely could tell the differences in even 93 and 89. I had 96,000 on it when I sold to get my 7.3 PSD. The definite advantage is on the long road trips, all of the Wal*Marts have 93 and only a handful have diesel...You will like it, just be careful who you have work on it when it comes time to change the plugs. Follow the torque settings and maybe add a cold air box to help out with power and milage....Take care and enjoy.....Dave

 

There are a lot of very satisfied V-10 owners on this forum, and in fact I'll go so far as to say that in a year of reading these forums I haven't seen anyone complain about the engine with the unfortunate exception of a couple of instances where the vehicles were torpedoed on the first trip right out of the dealership.

Now regarding your steering on the other hand, there are definitely some posts about superduty steering problems, quite a few on brand new trucks. Check out "death wobble".

I'll let others address the gas mileage issue, but particularly in the winter 10 mpg is what most people get. On these forums I'm guessing 98% would "re-buy" their V-10's in a heart beat!

 

Congrats on your new truck. With only 5,500 miles, your engine is still breaking in. Most V10 guys say that milage and power increase in the 7-10,000 mile range on the new trucks. I've been averaging 11-12 mpg with winter gas. A couple of tankfuls have been in the 14-15 mpg range (both with Arco/BP gas if you can believe that!). I don't think you'll ever see 20 mpg in a V10 with any regularity. But you don't have the maintenance cost's of a diesel either. I'm not anti-diesel by any means... I like the oil burners too.

 

I bought a V10 this summer (se signature) and I would buy another one in a minute. In town I get approx 10 to 11 MPH (unless in the city of Chicago where it is continual stop and go) and approx 14 MPH on the highway going 65. (During the winter the mileage drops a little due to the cold weather / denser air) We also use the truck for towing a 8K travel trailer. This truck just rocks.

 

Ato Z,

Welcom to FTE, congrats on the new truck and welcome to the BSEG club.

You're joining in with a great group of guys that will be more than helpful to you with this truck.

Don't be discouraged by your initial gas mileage. After the first 5 - 7K, these engines really start to loosen up nice. You should be looking at around 11 MPG day to day, 13-14 on the highway (unloaded), and 7-9 towing (depending on the weight). There is a MPG thread at the top of the forum, check it out.

Would I buy a V10 again? OH HELL YEAH! This is easily the best engine I have had in a truck. Love it!

Repairs......Ain't had a one yet and most guys in here will say the same thing. The sparkplug issue was a 99-01 problem, that has been corrected in the head design and thread count.

The only problem you'll have is if the wife gets ahold of the puppy. Then you'll never get it back. Unless you make it too big for her to get in.

Enjoy....You'll get many happy miles out of that beast.

BFR

 

Thanks for the info... I'm starting to feel better on the Mpg situation - the truck being brand new and all... The diesel in my blood is beginning to thin. I'm just having a hard time adjusting to the gas motors. So far I like what I hear.

 

Yeah, it's a little different animal. It likes to rev and has no problems doing it. It's built to handle 6000 RPM's, the rev limiter kicks in around 5400. Don't be afraid to let that puppy turn, it's more than happy to do so.

Your torque curve gets nice and flat a the 2100 rpm range, so don't be afraid to have it running 2250 - 2500 RPM's on the highway.

If you are wondering how solid this engine is, try PM'ing captchas. He was doing a rebuild with another fella and was saying the bottom end of this thing is absolutely bulletproof.

Get us some pictures, so we can see your new baby! Check out a few of the galleries if you want some good ideas for mods.

See you around.

BFR

 

Hey agian.......Mine did have a slight rattle on initial startup and I told my mechanic about it and it was just due to the lifters pumping back up and it was no problem but it sure sounded like a diesel when you first fired her up. And don't have the exhaust dualed out. They sound like a V-6 when you dual them out with loud mufflers........I heard one the other day and it sounded bad......not the low rumble a V-8 would have for sure........Enjoy the many miles to come.....Dave

 

Would I buy another one? I'm on my third, does that count? 2 F250's and a V-10 Excursion... I use to average 7.5 mpg with my 99 pulling a 28' enclosed car trailer, gross was around 8K for the trailer. Otherwise, I averaged around 10. I'm hoping the 06 with the 3V motor and 4.10's does a little better. I seriously considered the diesel but couldn't get past the extra cost of the motor and maintenance. For what I'm doing, I really didn't need it, and with the history of problems with the 6.0.....

 

I'm on my second V10, and would never consider any other motor in this truck. I get about 12 miles per gallon "daily driving" with no expressway drivng. It also gets 12 mpg when towing 7k on the expressway. Friends with late model 6.0L diesels are getting around 15, so I lose 3 miles per gallon. What I gain is easier and cheaper maintainance, no annoying smell, and until recently, much cheaper fuel. For a while in 2005 diesel was running as much as $1.00/gallon more than 87 octane, now they're pretty much even.

 

AtoZ I am answering this without reading the other posts so I don't get too distracted.

Firs yes I would do the Ford V10 again and again ( I think I have 30 to 40s years left) as long as Ford does not cripple her in the future with too many stupid innovations to get more MPG at the expense of performance.

You motor is getting right about average new MPGs and will get slightly better out around the 5000-9000 mile point. They take a long time to break in the entire drive train. The Rings set fairly early 250-700 miles but everything else take significantly longer to loosen up some.

The average for all of us is listed at the top of this forum. Generally all v10s average 12.5 mpg

This is an overhead cammed motor that make plenty of power down at 1900-2200RPM but she will pull strong from there up through 4800rpm and with in that wide a power band the ZF6 or 5R110 TorqShift have a lot of decent gear selection to pull just about any load and hill combination.

Once she gets a few thousand miles on her you and re-teach the auto trans if you have it.

Any Steering vagueness that I had at new on the Continental tires went away as they broke in. But they still are not very good tires. I am stuck with them because they are the only 18" tire available with the load carrying capacity to let me tow/haul at max GCVW rating.

Coil over front suspension made a significant difference in turning radius and (I think) a very slight improvement in off road behavior. I like it beter then the leaf sprung just for the added turning radius.
The 4FX pseudo Rancho (RS3000s) from Ford suck as shocks and some day I will put RS900s with the remote on her.

Enjoy the quiet power, don't be concerned with 3000-4800rpm runns up tall hills, she will pull high rmp loads all day long.

Expect 7 to 14 mpg as the range and around 12 mpg life time average. Remember the cost of the fuel is less, the cost of maintenance is less, and over 150,000 miles your total costs will be about the same as if it had the $3700 dollar PSD motor.

 

I'd buy another V-10. This is my second one, I had a '99 I ran 95,000 miles and never had a plug problem or oil consumption--nada-perfect. And, I traded for this '05 and experienced at 5k miles the main Bearing seized, Ford's warranty replaced the entire motor with a new crate engine.

Yeah, sure I'd but another. I have a freind who is a ser mgr at Chevy, and we talked a little about my grenaded new rig. He said Chevy has had a few of them grenade too, but they either fix them or short block em re using all the major componets they can from the bad motor. Chevy motor warranty using complete Crate motors are rare. How would you like that? I'd much rather get Ford's replacement crate motor warranty.

Anyway, mileage varries loaded to empty from 10 to 13-14. Remember, your rig weighs 7500# to 8000# which is about double what a car weighs, so yes it takes lots of horsepower to move that rig, and fuel makes horsepower, and dollars buy fuel. Just the way it works.

 

Fredvon4, what do you mean by this?? TNX!

 

I just bought a used 2003 supercab V-10, and I really am enjoying it, having owned 2 7.3 and one 6.0 diesel before.

I never had any problems with any of my diesels (other than a mild case of death wobble on my 05 6.0 liter).

So far the truck does everything I ask it to, I don't have to turn the motor off at the drive-thru, and I can have someone else change the oil for what it cost me to do myself on the diesels. My air filter costs 10% of the cost of a diesel's.

Unfortunately, I get 10.5 mpg no matter what I do (haven't towed anything really heavy yet). Which isn't great (my 6.0 got 14 average over the whole time I owned it), but I can buy a *lot* of frigging gas for the price difference.

The hot-rodder in me is disappointed that the easy power upgrades aren't available for the V-10 like they are for the turbocharged diesel, but I only really notice when I see the commercials on Trucks! or something like that.

I haven't had it long enough to comment on reliability from personal experience, but there are a lot of people I know that have had very positive experiences with the 10 cylinder motors.

Steve