V10 or Diesel ?

[DNFXDLI]

As long as you are happy that is all that matters.

 

[Hanau]

I love you too. Hug?

 

[rickpilgrim]

I guess this comes down to if the diesel in 2010 is far enough ahead in mpg to make it worth the cost. If the diesel is only getting 10-12 mpg thats about what we see from our gas units.

 

[Hanau]

That's pretty much the way I see it Rick. If the diesel engine was a $1500 option that got the same mpg as a gas engine, then I'd be more likely to buy one. However a $9K option has to pay for itself.

As it stands I think I could buy a Chevy 3500 4x4 CC DRW for just over $30K with the gas engine. Last diesel I bought I paid just under $40K for it.

 

[rickpilgrim]

When I started this biz 24 yrs ago A diesel truck gave you a good 6-8 mpg over the gas and if you treated them well better durability. Around here, or rather where I moved to it's in the country but 2 mi from the city. A Diesel never really gets warmed up in summer at all so the durability isn't there. That leaves milage as the sole reason to spend $8700 for a diesel.
The Ford dealer moved 1 1/2 mile away from me on the same road. We mow the lawn for them, plow the snow and next(this) yr they want us to do a waterscape thing for them. Considering the problems we've had with GM of late we will be buying another Ford.

 

[emtzach]

I know I am getting into this late. so dont bash on me.. My first question is who drives your trucks? Unless it is just you then you would only assume that the one driving it is driving responsibly. You are saying your getting 10mpg, is this with a fully loaded trailer or just an average. It doesnt take much to go from 15mpg to 10mpg with a heavy foot. not to mention if you put a few hundred into it you could increase your mpg and overall durability. The private ambulance company I worked for had 250,000 miles or so on half the front line fleet and some in the 400,000 that where still used as primary back up. Just my thought on this thread, of course being a buisness owner you have all the info in front of you to decide I just feel that if you were to repair instead of buying new you might come out ahead. there are pleanty of wrecked trucks out there that you can strip parts out and have them on hand for your fleet. good luck with your decision in any case

 

[Truckin4life]

The later year 6.0's are good trucks, they need to be opened up, driven with the pedal on the floor from time to time to clean em out. Had a 06 with the 6.0 for my work truck how i drive the truck never had issues. In houston driving like a bat out of hell is required, or you will get run over. It was a GREAT truck. No complaints what so ever, considering buying one for my DD.
If you drive it like gramma and let it idle for extended periods of time with out a high idle kit installed they tend to have alot of problems...
Truck got warmed up for a little in the morning especially when it was cold out. Then it was driven how the truck was designed to be driven, wide open.
Diesel vs gas is really no comparison, i did ALOT of towing with the truck fully loaded 24ft goose neck most of the time...
That truck never let me down, never left me stranded, i had no problems with it. It was bought with a bad ac, got that fixed twice second time was cause the shop made a mistake. Repairing the ac...
But all in all great truck.

I am also coming into this thread late, but just putting in my experience and 2 cents worth.

 

[Lost]

Its a give and take.

We have 10 F350 F450 v10 trucks . NOne have got over 120000 without issues . We wish we would get 10 MPG with empty bed. The first hill we come to they kick into passing and never come out probably why they blow..The 460 equipped truck keep right up and get 2 MPG better.

They r being traded (some with 20000 miles ) As soon as the next motors prove themselves.

But in town level area it would be fine.

Diesel like said Not worth $$. As far as MPG . We just have better luck with them .

Its what you want and like . Your the man

 

[FordF-SuperDuty]

Personally I would order a V10 if I was getting SRW because you can only get 3.55 rear with a diesel and 4.30 with a V10.

 

[polarbear]

Personally I would order a V10 if I was getting SRW because you can only get 3.55 rear with a diesel and 4.30 with a V10.

Why would that matter? PSD has a different power curve- the low gearing really doesn't help it any in real life drivng.The V10 needs it, though, because the torque peak is so much higher up on the powerband.

The whole diesel vs. gas argument will be moot in a year anyways, when Ford pulls the plug on the V10.

 

[emtzach]

 

[rickpilgrim]

I am now leaning toward the V10 at this point. Diesel trucks have not worked out for us in the past 15 yrs and with all the short trips on the summer mowing route they never get warmed up. No lectures on how to run a diesel engine please, I have several Toro GM325 mowers with Mitsu diesels and I have 2 that have 9927.6 and 9975.3 hrs and still run strong.
What I was mainly looking for here was some advise on which engine for the F-350 we will buy would work better for us, based on towing, driving and cost things.
V10 is not new to me, I believe Dodge put that big V10 emblem on the fender as the best mpg ours ever got was 10, the worst was 10, empty, loaded, windy, uphill it didn't matter we got 10. A friend of mine has an early SRW F-350 w/V10 and claims 14 mpg empty and 11-12 towing.
When it's Saturday I get to drive the 7 trucks I own, Mon - Friday I have some colledge kids, some 30 somethings driving. Who drives is more determined by what my insurance agent says about driving record. I'm sure there is no easy driving, you have X jobs to do in Y hrs and you know what that brings.
So what do you diesel guys get for mpg towing? For the cost of the diesel option do you feel you made the right decision? Same for anyone with a V10, are they as good mpg wise as my friend says? And will a V10 go 150K mi without problems? I'd really like to know, as my dealer keeps trying to push a diesel on me, but I want rubber floors, cloth seats and crank windows and that means special order.

 

[rickpilgrim]

And our 87 F-250's 460 c6 4.10 gets 12-13 with the 18'trailer. If the V10 is 2 mpg less thats 10-11 which is right where my GM dually with the 509 cid Cad engine is, and thats okay with me. Small motor shifts gears so much transmissions wear out fast, and then the motor dies shortly after you fix that, not a good situation. The second red Dodge v10 got us 155K before it was "joyrode" into a field and found on it's side/roof by the police. I would expect Fords V10 would be comperable, or am I wrong?

 

[rickpilgrim]

I know I am getting into this late. so dont bash on me.. My first question is who drives your trucks? Unless it is just you then you would only assume that the one driving it is driving responsibly. You are saying your getting 10mpg, is this with a fully loaded trailer or just an average. It doesnt take much to go from 15mpg to 10mpg with a heavy foot. not to mention if you put a few hundred into it you could increase your mpg and overall durability. The private ambulance company I worked for had 250,000 miles or so on half the front line fleet and some in the 400,000 that where still used as primary back up. Just my thought on this thread, of course being a buisness owner you have all the info in front of you to decide I just feel that if you were to repair instead of buying new you might come out ahead. there are pleanty of wrecked trucks out there that you can strip parts out and have them on hand for your fleet. good luck with your decision in any case

Need to add on-busness is good and need to add another crew next yr. Don't wan't to spend more time in shop fixing old junk, rather be there doing non buisness stuff
Now excuse me please, I have to go change a transmission in plow truck 3, and every time I do this I think how nice it would be to have something new that works right, fixing all the time is not good for the family life.

 

[polarbear]

I am now leaning toward the V10 at this point. Diesel trucks have not worked out for us in the past 15 yrs and with all the short trips on the summer mowing route they never get warmed up. No lectures on how to run a diesel engine please, I have several Toro GM325 mowers with Mitsu diesels and I have 2 that have 9927.6 and 9975.3 hrs and still run strong.
What I was mainly looking for here was some advise on which engine for the F-350 we will buy would work better for us, based on towing, driving and cost things.
V10 is not new to me, I believe Dodge put that big V10 emblem on the fender as the best mpg ours ever got was 10, the worst was 10, empty, loaded, windy, uphill it didn't matter we got 10. A friend of mine has an early SRW F-350 w/V10 and claims 14 mpg empty and 11-12 towing.
When it's Saturday I get to drive the 7 trucks I own, Mon - Friday I have some colledge kids, some 30 somethings driving. Who drives is more determined by what my insurance agent says about driving record. I'm sure there is no easy driving, you have X jobs to do in Y hrs and you know what that brings.
So what do you diesel guys get for mpg towing? For the cost of the diesel option do you feel you made the right decision? Same for anyone with a V10, are they as good mpg wise as my friend says? And will a V10 go 150K mi without problems? I'd really like to know, as my dealer keeps trying to push a diesel on me, but I want rubber floors, cloth seats and crank windows and that means special order.

Our School District runs about 30 trucks for Ground Ops. They get run constantly, multiple drivers, but all short hops. It's a big District (18000 kids, 3,000 employees), but the trucks never go more than 15 miles in one direction before being shut off.

Fleet Mgt has done exhaustive cost analysis on what to buy that'll get the joib done, but keep the cost/mile as low as possible. This study gets done about every three years- I've been involved in two of them (I mentioned I'm on the Budget Committee, right?).

The equipment these trucks pull is very similiar to what a landscaping operation would have- with the exception of the Big Toro field mowers.

(like this- we have 2)

For the big mowers, 2 F350 Supercab V10's. 2WD, fleet units (bought through Oregon State Bid).

The rest of the fleet is divided up between Dodge 1/2T regular cabs (serious) and Ford F250 2WD Reg Cabs. The district will literally drive these trucks until it isn't economically feasable to run them anymore. Two Dodges and a Chevy date back into the 80's.

 

[rickpilgrim]

What a Coincidence! This comming spring we have won the Contract for 3 of the 9 schools in the district. If this works out, in another year or two we will likely be working all 9. We are the only Landscape Co in the area with a WAM and mainly recycler mowers, that was a big part of the bid. What you show on your pic is the evolution of the 580D we bought this fall when we had recieved advance notification of the bid award. If you look on Toro's website go to the Golf and Turf section, the 328 Groundsmaster is the Kubota engined 325D Groundsmaster. I have 3-325D's, 2-345's and 2-322Ds and now a 580D.
If you are towing around a 580 and a 328D with a V10 F-350 the that should have all the power we need, as we will be doing the same. My only question on this is the durability of the V10, from local people I have heard 80K, 100K or so and here 120K before issues. All machines have issues, what bothers me is the issue where a tow truck is required.

 

[FordF-SuperDuty]

If you use don't abuse and maintain it I could see a life of about 150K but that is just a guess.

 

[5.0Flareside]

If you use don't abuse and maintain it I could see a life of about 150K but that is just a guess.

id say around 125k is where you start getting into issues.

 

[RocketScience]

Easy boys don't make me put on my mod hat here!

And where is that Ford vs. The Rest forum when you need it?

 

[rickpilgrim]

If you use don't abuse and maintain it I could see a life of about 150K but that is just a guess.

Our maintainence is by the factory severe schedual for all of our vehicles around here. We use only high quality lubricants and filters. We still see more rear tire wear than front but it is the type of wear that comes with heavy loading, rather than from wheelspin. The closest thing to off roading the trucks see is turning arount in the field behind our shop, which is mowed and smooth. Lastly, this will not be a plow truck, and probably not used in winter for a few yrs unless needed for backup duty for our walkway crew.
There are issues and then there are ISSUES with durability. I fully expect to see the check engine light come on a few times, We have a Snap On Modus diagnostic unit for that. Brakes and suspension things are a given with all the towing, Haven't had a hitch ball mount make more than 1 summer without slopping out the pin hole with all the towing we do.
ISSUES are like when the crank broke (6.5 GM diesel), the connecting rod went out, locking up the motor(7.3 powerstroke) only first gear and reverse left by the Dodge 2500 HD diesel (covered under warranty) but all things I don't need when there are less than 150K mi.