Well I recently bought my first truck. (age 17).
Its a 1990 Ford F-250 7.3L Diesel. Love it. Though Due to the larger engine and year I'm kinda concern on its consumption of diesel.

Any tips to save some gas?
Also was told I could go to Mc D. and ask for fryer oil and filter out the bits and such and dump it in the truck as a source of fuel... Though Im not too sure on that sounds odd.

 

How many miles on the truck? Steer clear of the fryer oil and anyone that suggests to use it, trust me when I say that's not regular tobacco in their cigarette's . They might be suggesting bio diesel but there's more to making it than just straining fryer oil. My guess is that at your age you don't have the coin to dish out on a tuner or other expensive upgrades that might improve MPG. Also if the truck has high miles on it then that would just be a waste of money. Unless someone here knows some other tricks then my advice is to just drive it and bite the bullet on the cost of fuel. Unless you need the diesel it may have been a bad idea to buy it if you are already worried about it costing too much to drive. Don't mean to offend you in any way but you bought a BIG truck with a BIG engine and it's a little late to start being concerned that it might be hard on fuel. Keep it tuned up, air filter clean and try to keep your foot off the floorboard and that will save you some fuel. Like I said someone else on here might have some tips for you, Good Luck.

 

One way to save gas is not to buy any and you have just the truck to let you get by with that trick.

 

umm, You'll only get about 2 blocks per gallon of GAS before the engine goes BOOM!!!

You need FUEL, Not GAS.

Do a search on BioFuel. Plenty of info out there.

 

Wow, nice to see you guys helping the kid out here, give him a break for saying "gas" mileage instead of "fuel" mileage, we all know what he meant. Must have been an easy life when your spelling and grammar were perfect at 17??

 

Welcome to FTE! I believe you need to replace fuel lines, etc, on that year truck in order to be able to run bio. I want to say that Ford made the change in ~1997 to fuel lines that won't be broken down by it. If you are looking for better fuel economy, stay with regular diesel. Your mileage will suffer if you use any blend of bio. Go with Brandon's advice and keep it well maintained and don't drive it like you stole it. That was hard for me at 17, but try to keep the rpms down.

 

A little good natured "tough love".
You want him to learn the hard way on the streets or in this Ford diesel friendly "educational" forum?

And we didn't say anything about spelling or grammar, but you imply there is something wrong in that area?

 

Read EVERYTHING you can find on your vehicle here on the FTE forum. Keep it maintained. If anything goes wrong, the guys here on the forum are awesome and can talk you through about everything. Keep your RPM's under 2000 for better gas mileage. Use a cetane booster in your fuel tank. Keep the air filter clean.

 

Expect to get 13-15 mpg, especially around town. If you don't like the sound of that, you might want to look at getting a different vehicle.

Honestly, compared to any gas V6 or V8 powered truck or SUV, 13 mpg around town in a 3/4 ton is actually pretty good.

 

well i get 24 on the freeway and about 16 in town, and considering what it is thats not bad

 

x2

Keep the truck in good running order and don't treat every stop light like a drag racing Christmas tree!

Keep the RPMs under 2000 and use Power Service Diesel Kleen (gray bottle). 3oz/gallon. I don't have any horsepower mods and I get 16mpg overall. If I do a lot of city then it drops closer to 15mpg and if I do a lot of highway then it jumps to around 18mpg. My rig tips the scale at 7700lbs (no driver).

Also, there's more to running WVO (waste vegetable oil) than filtering out the chunks. That would be a $8000 mistake... Otherwise we'd all be doing it!

 

put a turbo and 5" straight pipe on it. make sure its loud, and i do mean loud. after a couple of tickets you will be so worried about the cops, you will have geo's honking at you, but you will be using as little of fuel as possible...

no but really, a turbo and decent exhaust system will help, you want to let it breathe. you didn't say what your truck had for a tranny, as overdrive makes one hell of a difference. I drove an 88 f350 that had a 7.3 and 5 speed with 4.10's I kept it off the interstate and got 15 no problem (with loaded utility box and portable welder on the back). keep an eye on your tires, inflation is important, but a bad alignment can cost you.

number one is to take pride in your truck and what it is. a work truck (that when treated right, can not only make a nice driver, but works good for getting girls- make sure to keep it clean!)

the idi's are different animals than powerstrokes.

and don't worry about the old guys here, thier bark is worse then thier bite...

 

If you go down to the 6.9-7.3 IDI forum you will find alot of guys with knowledge to spare on these trucks. A custom intake,3" exhuast, proper timing and easey on the smoke pedal will help alot. I have an 86 6.9 with c6 tranny in my 88 Bronco and get an average of 17 mpg's. These old IDI diesels are great engines. Strong and reliable, easy to work on and alot cheaper than powerstrokes $100-150 for a set of injectors compared to almost that for one on a stroke lol.

 

Well I bought the truck cause 1. Its diesel. 2. I'm gonna use it for work. 3. I like it.

My concern was really how well does it do fuel mileage.

How exactly do you calculate Miles per gallon?

 

That ones a little more straight forward to answer. Fill the tank to the top and write down the mileage (or reset trip meter if you have). Drive til you need fuel and make a note of how many gallons of fuel it takes to fill again. Now also make a note of how many miles you have driven since you last filled. Divide the miles you have driven by how many gallons you put in and that will give you your MPG.
ex/ 400miles since last fill
50 gallons to fill truck
400/50= 8 MPG
As long as you know how far you've driven since your last fill you can easily calculate this any time you fill your truck.