Posted on 05/13/2012 8:41:05 AM PDT by waterhill
My 02 GMC has 200k+ on her now, she is showing signs of old age. I want to upgrade to a diesel. Just wondering what the FReeper World thinks is the best diesel 3/4 ton or 1 ton truck.
I am not picky about brand names. I could go with a Ford for political reasons......
Much as garcias....
I have a 2002 Silverado 2500 HD crew cab with 80,000 miles. It has an 8.1 litre engine with an Allison heavy duty transmission. it has the full towing package but I never towed anything with it. Interior is leather, both front seats are 6 way electric, and it has a DVD entertainment system for the rear seat. Make me an offer.
With fuel prices being what they are, I STRONGY recommend that you DO NOT buy more truck than you absolutely need. The higher up in load ratings you go, the more thirsty the truck is.
If you can get by with a 3/4 ton truck, don’t buy a one ton.
Diesel engines last much longer than gasoline engines but they burn fuel that costs much more. The advantage to diesels is they get better mileage when hauling heavy loads compared to gasoline engines that are hauling heavy loads. The disadvantage is, diesel engines jack up the purchase price of a truck and when you are driving around with no load(ie and empty truck) diesel isn’t as efficient as gasoline.
So if you haul/tow a lot, then the diesel makes sense. If you do a lot of driving with no load or minimal load, then the diesel does not make sense.
Keep in mind that trucks nowdays are rated for much higher loads than they used to be. In otherwords, a new half ton truck will have a higher payload rating than a half ton truck from 1990.
If I was going to buy a new truck, I would probably go for a Ford with their new turbocharged gasoline V6. I would choose a 2WD with limited slip and a stick shift if I could get one with that motor. Stick shifts are not available in Ford F150s so I would go with the F250. My tendency is to go with a truck that is slightly under rated for my needs and then put some helper springs on it.
Everyone has different needs and uses for their truck though. Only you can determine if you will actually get all the usefulness of a diesel to justify the extra cost to purchase and more expensive fuel.
Goosneck trailer. Nuff said.
Go away.
I heard that the 8.1 was originally designed as a marine engine, has a super strong web casting, roller tappets and is almost like a diesel engine in torque, and some agency decided it was too good to have in the 2500-3500 series trucks and GM discontinued it, you can still get the engine from a 2 ton chassis or as its original design a marine engine or in an RV.
Talk on the streets is to keep the motor, years from now it will be the most sought after high performance big block platform short of a Rodek.
Oh, but to answer your question, which diesel is best...
Ford currently has the best diesel engine. Dodge used to have the best diesel but when they redesigned that cummins a few years back to have 4 valve heads, it lost some of its ruggedness.
Ford used to have the navistar diesel built by international. It was crap. A few years ago ford built their own diesel engine and it is impressive. It has a two stage turbo built by Honeywell that is quite impressive. It’s got reverse flow heads on it so the intake is on the outsides of the “V” and the exhaust goes to the center of the “V”, which is where the massive Honeywell turbo sits.
I actually hate to admit this because I prefer inline sixes and the cummins is an inline six. But the truth is that ford motor really rocks.
The cummins motor aint what it used to be. When they upgraded it to 4valves per cylinder, it lost some of its durability.
I am leaning that way.
“I Need a Truck, by Warren Zevon”
I need a truck to haul my pain
I need a truck just to haul around my name
I need a truck to haul all the womens from my bed
I need a truck to haul my body when I’m dead
I need a truck to haul my guns to town
I need a truck to haul my bad thoughts around
I need a truck to haul my percodan and gin
And I need a truck to haul all my trucks in
As a mechanic I prefer a slightly heavier suspension but thats due to me driving in Alaska, and a bigger engine is under less strain, in some tests a larger engine driven conservatively will get better mileage than a smaller engine wound out at a higher rpm constantly.
But its ever so changing every year, for communing I would get an import diesel truck if possible, for general truck I would suggest a non dually 1 ton chassis with rear disc brakes, you have stronger axles, stronger brakes and a beefier tranny.
I love the Allison, rock strong transmission though the earlier NP transfer cases would fail prematurely, especially those in 2001 and the Auto Trac such as in the Yukon.
Dodge with Cummins Diesel...get a pre 2008...better motor you can play with
old Powerstrokes are powerful but thirsty
Duramax...smooth...i’ll give them that...and come with Allison tranny
but my 2006 Dodge Mega Cab got 21 miles to gallon overall...a 3/4 tonne truck...and needed no chip to kick ass
new diesels in truck are like Porsche motors...totally trimmed out...not much you can do to them
and the new Cummins is not as strong...but still beats the comp
I’m old and have owned all trucks for 4 decades next year
and grew up in a hardcore 1950s/1960s GMC and International family
but my 2 cents on diesels
lol, no not an alternate universe...just designed by the jerries at Daimler Benz. It was Daimler-Chrysler for a few years remember? The germans redesigned everything.
Tell you what. Just go down to the dealers and open the hood and see if you can see the ground looking down on the engine.
Ford and Chevy? Nope, nearly impossible to see the ground. Dodge? Yup. You can see the ground and they are a lot easier to work on. The cummins engine puts out all that horse power in an inline 6. They last and run at 20 to 24 miles per gallon with a 6 speed stick. I wouldnt buy a diesel with a auto...EVER. Besides that, I understand that GM sold Allison and the repair kits are now hard to get for that auto. The Allison automatics tend to start leaking because the seals give out. The Fords have a pretty good Auto, Dodge..not so good. A standard in a diesel is the only way to go.
I had a 3500 03 dodge 4x4 with the cummins and a six speed stick. The best truck I ever had. It had 73 rears and not the 411s. The truck would go down the road at whatever speed I wanted. With the stick I had the low hole gear for heavy start pulling if I needed. I always started it out in second. I pulled my mini excavator-JD 50 with all the attachments from the UP of Mich to here in western AZ and had no problems whatever. A friend of mine talked me into selling the dam thing to him a couple years ago. He paid me 24 grand for it and he uses it to pull his skid steer and 38 foot boat since his Ford wouldnt handle them. I had 280 thousand miles on it
The problem I had with it is the brakes. In this desert the dam brakes always give me fits on all my vehicles. In the begining, I had problems with the U Joints-they are sealed from the factory, and I fixed that with U Joints from NAPA that are greasable. I also had to do the front end because I used to really drive on some really nasty roads. 3500 bucks for that one and I fixed that problem with greaseable joints.
BTW..I have a degree in Marine Diesel Engineering.
Ford sells more trucks than everyone else combined. It’s been that way for at least 20 years. The reason is they sell to all the government agencies and the big companies who buy large numbers. Fords are, generally, built as plain jane work vehicles and get beat to hell. Chevy’s are, generally, built as fancy vehicles for the private owner who likes to pamper his truck. Dodge is built for motorheads. They are a strange breed. They only care about the engine.
The only reason you see more old fords on the road is because there are so many more of them built every year. When the governments and large corporations buy new vehicles, the budget conscious private owner buys up the used fleet fords for low prices.
The one thing on any new auto vehicle is a tranny dipstick. Grrrr.
I’ll give them credit due for high performance diesels such as in the Mercs and Jags. But you won’t see those as options here in the good ole Yoo Ess of Ehh.
Nope the big 3 and the unions won;t let America experiance those super duper 150mph performance diesels, nor the 50 plus mpg gallon ones in the small cars.
Boiler plate and rivets ia all we have in the dealerships, and poor fuel mileage, I dare say the car lots will stay full this year.
Me as I said earler will look into the natural gas option. That I believe is the way to go, esoecially when you can bypass road fuel taxation by re-filling at home.
No wonder the Feds want tattletell black boxes, they know what will happen in a few years, electrics will fizzle (pun intended)and gas engines will downsize. Diesels will be around but require expensive pump fuel. Unless you have other resources, that leaves us with another option and the Feds may stall it because it in itself will reduce taxes if a lot of people fill up at home.
So they will tax per mile.
Sorry to take a rant about the topic.
I am looking at 2010 and up. No leather, no fancy stuff for me. I put 30k on a truck in a year sometimes. I need a comfortable ride, but don’t need all the bells and whistles.
But, just for the sake of it, where are you located?
I am in Texas, No more than 50k to spend. Thats a chunk of change. Thats my limit.
I’m keeping my 91 Chevy that has 311,000 miles on it. It pulls my new trailer just fine.
“Dodges, because they have Cummings diesels, which last forever and get good mileage, too,”
306,000 miles on my 95 Cummins and not even an oil leak, and doesn’t even use a drop of oil between changes. Should last another 3-400,000, I will be gone before it is.
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