I recently bought a 1998 Expepdtion Eddie Bauer with the 5.4L engine with towing package and 3.73 gear ratio. I also bought a 8.5 foot wide X 24 long box trailer to haul my motorcycles, etc. Around town and on 55mph roads I can get about 10 mpg after I get the thing rolling, but on a trip to Florida from New York (1200 milezs one way) we were towing the trailer(3500 #'s empty) plus about 1500 #'3 of gear and machines. This is well under the maximum towing capactiy of the truck so I figured we would be getting 12 or better gas milage on the highway going between 65-70mpg all the way to Florida. To my amazement I was only getting around 5 mpg!!!!! It was too late to turn back, but I had alot of miles to go at this low milage. In the really flat states south of PA the truck could get into overdrive occasionally and get up to 7mpg. I had no idea this was going to happen. The trailer sticks out about a foot on either side of the truck and is about 2.5 feet taller than the truck. I spoke to a guy in florida that was towing a trialer like mine with more wieght inside and a truck camper in the back of his diesel superduty and he said that he got 15-17mpg all the way from NY to Fl. I love the truck, but, I can't go on getting milage like this..I am ready to start looking for a diesel. But, before I do something drastic I am hoping you guys might have some peice of advice that might help me keep my truck!! All my milage figures have come from the computer with none written calculations done at fill ups..and they seem to be accurate. Any info you could pass on about towing with diesels or towing with expeditions or any advise to help me get better milage would be great!

Thanks for your time,
Chris smoke_em1(No Email Addresses In Posts!)

PS. I am willing to do slight modifcations to the truck to help it do better with a load behind it.

 

I had a '00 EB Expy with 5.4 and 3.55 rear and got 7-8 mpg towing a 6000 lb trailer. I just traded for an '01 Suburban 3/4T with 8.1 L Vortec and 4.10 rear. Can't have too much power when towing.