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Whats pulling your RPod |
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wooleeman 
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Joined: 01 Sep 2017 Location: Southeastern PA Online Status: Offline Posts: 80 |
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 Topic: Whats pulling your RPodPosted: 21 Aug 2018 at 10:28pm |
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I know the 1/2 ton is plenty to tow the POD but I have been considering purchasing a larger trailer and wanted to research all of the increased expenses. |
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2022 RP-202
2016 RP-179 (Sold 9/2020) 2014 Silverado Crew Cab. 6-1/2' Bed Golden Retriever (DOB 6/16/2020) English Bulldog (RIP 6/15/2020) |
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Woodmiester
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Joined: 03 Aug 2018 Location: Greenwood IN Online Status: Offline Posts: 142 |
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Posted: 12 Sep 2018 at 9:09am |
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Pulling with a 2004 Explorer Sport Trac.. Great job.......Over with the big trucks going up long steep grades
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Swampfox
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Stealth_81
Newbie 
Joined: 15 Apr 2019 Location: Wisconsin Online Status: Offline Posts: 9 |
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Posted: 17 Apr 2019 at 10:35am |
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We have two vehicles set up to tow our 179. My 2017 Tundra is the primary because of the cargo room in the bed. My wife's 2016 4-Runner works as well and we used it for a short trip last Fall. The thing we found is that the Tundra' 5.7L V-8 regularly gets around 14-15 mpg in mixed daily driving and it drops to 12 or so pulling the R-Pod. The 4-Runner with the 4.0L V-6 gets 18-20 in daily driving but drops to the same 12 mpg as the Tundra when pulling the camper. If the mileage gain was worth it I would use the 4-Runner but the Tundra wins the tie. I haven't had any problems pulling with either vehicle. The hitch heights are identical so no adjustments need to be made for going from one to the other.
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2018 R-Pod 179
His - 2019 F-150 Super Crew 3.5 Eco Hers - 2016 4-Runner 4.0 V-6 |
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Commander203
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Joined: 19 Feb 2015 Location: Central Texas Online Status: Offline Posts: 87 |
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Posted: 17 Apr 2019 at 4:02pm |
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Hello all, It has been a while since I’ve posted butI do drop in every now and then as the info here
works on most travel trailers. I find the last few posts on this subject very
familiar. First off I sold my Pod a few years ago and decided camping wasn’t
for us. I owned an r-pod 179 towed by a Toyota Tundra 4.6 liter V8. Excellent
setup and never should have traded the truck. So bought a 2016 Silverado 5.3 liter V8 with tow package.
(Tow package was by accident as I had no plans for another trailer) Moving
along to 2018 we got the camping fever again and bought a 30 foot trailer with
a max loaded weight of 7500 lbs. After loading and weighing on a CAT scale it
weighed a little over 6300 lbs. Towed it a bit with this truck for a while but
had limited payload. Truck pulled and handled well but with a tong weight of
790 lbs, two labs, my wife and I, left only a few pounds for equipment. So, like the Abercrombies I traded the 1500 and bought a 2018 Denali 2500 HD. If you are squeezing
out 11 mpg towing that’s great, congrats. The reason I posted this is if I was planning to purchase a
vehicle now with plans of upgrading later to a larger trailer, knowing what my
experiences have been I’d spend the extra cash and go diesel because owners
state they get between 18-20 MPG towing. With the long history of this hobby of
traveling and camping that certainly will probably be in my future. Thanks for reading this long post and hopefully you gained
some info and will make a wise decision on your next tow vehicle and give it
more thought than I did. Love the truck just hate the fuel mileage. Like stated
earlier by the Abercrombies, “live & learn”.
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Mike & Erin
2013 Tundra 4.6L V8 (Tow PK) 2006 Honda Goldwing GL 1800 2005 Honda VTX 1800N |
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Commander203
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Joined: 19 Feb 2015 Location: Central Texas Online Status: Offline Posts: 87 |
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Posted: 17 Apr 2019 at 4:04pm |
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Mike & Erin
2013 Tundra 4.6L V8 (Tow PK) 2006 Honda Goldwing GL 1800 2005 Honda VTX 1800N |
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DavMar
Senior Member
Joined: 04 Aug 2017 Location: Lexington, NC Online Status: Offline Posts: 592 |
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Posted: 17 Apr 2019 at 8:17pm |
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Sorry, but tell me why don't you just go buy a diesel pusher motor home?  |
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Dave & Marlene J with Zoey the
wonder dog. 2017 Rpod 180 2016 Toyota Tacoma SR5 4x4 Lexington, NC |
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Commander203
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Joined: 19 Feb 2015 Location: Central Texas Online Status: Offline Posts: 87 |
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Posted: 17 Apr 2019 at 9:09pm |
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Hopefully I didn't offend you. I was just sharing my experience. But to answer your question, we are still unsure if we will continue with this hobby. Next, I neither want or can afford a diesel pusher. I'll be 64 years old shortly and don't know even if I'll be able to continue camping. My thinking is if I have to give up the hobby hopefully I'll still be able to drive a truck. I am totally retired and as most retirees living on a fixed income has a few restrictions. Right now while enjoying the hobby, figured I'd share the info on the expense of larger tow vehicles.
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Mike & Erin
2013 Tundra 4.6L V8 (Tow PK) 2006 Honda Goldwing GL 1800 2005 Honda VTX 1800N |
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offgrid
Senior Member
Joined: 23 Jul 2018 Online Status: Offline Posts: 5290 |
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Posted: 18 Apr 2019 at 6:00am |
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You have to be really careful when comparing towing fuel economy numbers. Towing even a small full height trailer like an rPod at freeway speeds is going to be dominated by the air drag of the trailer. If you have any headwind or tailwind (even 5 mph) it makes a huge difference, because air drag changes with the square of the wind speed. So for example towing at 60 mph into a 5 mph headwind will increase drag 17%. Of course, if you're climbing or descending any hills or mountains all bets are off. There have been innumerable posts on this and other forums on fuel economy. Lots of shall we say "optimistic" figures are quoted.  Bottom line is that flat highway no wind fuel economy with a modern, efficient, gas powered tow vehicle (doesn't really matter much which one) is going to be around 13-15 mpg at 60 mph. I average right in the middle, 14 mpg under those conditions, so I'll use that number for the rest of this post. Diesel has about 12% higher energy content than gasoline, and it also happens to cost about that much more than gasoline. You get what you pay for. In other words, if you got 12% better fuel economy from a diesel (around 15.7 mpg under the same flat, no wind conditions) you would be coming out equal to a gas engine in both cost and overall efficiency. But diesel engines run at higher compression ratios than gas engines, so are usually more efficient, depending on the specific engines in the tow vehicles you are comparing. And modern gasoline engines are catching up fast. If you are looking at the highway mpg specs for the same vehicle with different engines then you should be able to compare these efficiency differences directly. So take for example the 2019 F150 with the 3 liter powerstroke diesel vs the 3.5 liter ecoboost gasser. You can be sure that Ford has tried their best to make both those engines as fuel efficient as possible. The diesel is rated at 30 mpg highway and the gasser at 25. Thats 20% better fuel economy, so the typical 14 mpg gasser towing fuel economy ought to come out around 16.8 mpg on diesel. But, you have to adjust that down by the 12% for the higher cost/energy content of diesel so the 16.8 mpg becomes the gasoline equivalent of about 15 mpg. Bottom line after all the math is that you might pick up about 3 mpg towing a pod with the f150 diesel vs the ecoboost gasser but after compensating for the higher cost of diesel its going to be more like a 1 mpg improvement equivalent. This might come out differently with a different tow vehicle but I doubt it would be by much. Is that worth the drawbacks of driving a diesel vs a gasoline vehicle? Not to me, but YMMV... |
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1994 Chinook Concourse
1995 RV6A Experimental Aircraft 2015 Rpod 179 - sold |
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lostagain
Senior Member
Joined: 06 Sep 2016 Location: Quaker Hill, CT Online Status: Offline Posts: 2595 |
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Posted: 18 Apr 2019 at 8:08am |
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Another factor to consider between diesel and gasoline is that diesel is a lot dirtier. There have been tremendous strides in cleaning up gasoline engines' emissions but the technology for emission control of diesel engines has not kept pace. And so many manufacturers have fudged their numbers so much that the data isn't very reliable either.
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Never leave footprints behind.
Fred & Maria Kearney Sonoma 167RB Our Pod 172 2019 Ford F-150 4x4 2.7 EcoBoost |
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offgrid
Senior Member
Joined: 23 Jul 2018 Online Status: Offline Posts: 5290 |
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Posted: 20 Apr 2019 at 5:57am |
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One of the drawbacks of diesels now for me is the requirement to add urea based diesel exhaust fluid (DEF) to meet emissions requirements. I think the f150 has about a 5 gal tank of the stuff that lasts maybe around 10k miles. Not a big cost issue but something else to have to deal with.
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1994 Chinook Concourse
1995 RV6A Experimental Aircraft 2015 Rpod 179 - sold |
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When not towing the best I’ve gotten is around 13 MPG highway and
only 11 in the city. By the way that is
with the 6 liter gas V8. Tows the trailer like a beast, love the bells and whistles
but fuel mileage is no joke as a tow vehicle.