Your mileage was so poor to start with, I guess a 2.6 mpg increase isn't unheard of. Your truck should have gotten way better than that stock. I don't have a 3/4 ton truck, but turn 2.75-20.s with 3.92 gears and get 16-17 all the time and on the road approach 20 mpg. I have a DSP tuner but I never saw mpg increase from the tuner at all. I've gotten the numbers above with the truck stock. If I was only getting 10, and was running a business, I'd trade it off and get a Cummins. I know your truck is heavier than mine, but 10 mpg is just a joke.

 

That's the nature of the beast owning a 3/4 ton gasser. A diesel isn't the answer for me, either. I know my circumstances better than anybody. If I want to save on gas I hop in my 84' Rampage.

My 04' quad cab Laramie 4x4 could only get about 15 on the highway and 12 in town. I could get 20 if I set the cruise at 55mph on a perfectly flat highway and there was NO wind. Or If I had a good tailwind I could get close to that.

I should shine more light on MY driving conditions that might help explain my 10.8 average:
1) Living in rural ND, 91 octane is only available at the larger stations, so most of the time I am forced to run crappy 89octane with 10% ethanol added. Truck runs better with the 91. Diesel can be even harder to find unless its off-road blend (don't get caught with that in your tank)

2) Its usually very windy here, there is a reason our state has so many wind farms. That's why I tell fellow members to wait and let me log more miles because the wind here gives me mpg numbers that are all over the place. Yeah I CAN GET 17 mpg screaming down interstate, but that's only because I have a 25mph tailwind. If I point my high and heavy 2500 into a headwind of even as little as 10mph it will KILL my mileage. Side wind will decrease it too.

3)In the winters it gets down to -40F without the windchill. Streets fill with snow and you have to plow through it to get around. NO vehicle will get good mileage around here in the winter. Don't even get me started on how many diesels have issues around here when it gets cold. And it can change fast, perfect example is Sunday here it was 49F Monday it was 85F.

4)My truck has about 800lbs of extra weight in it from tools, materials, etc. at all times.

 

Depends how aggressive you go with your cam. Trans can always be rebuilt and built up But yeah, you will for sure see better performance results with your cam and a custom tune than I am seeing with just The Dog.

 

People can say what they will, thanks for providing this info, im glad its working out for you, maybe some other members will give it a shot as well and we can get more opinions on it.

 

I agree. I know there are members that have the Bully Dogs it just seems that none of them ever really posted their results with them. Also its hard to figure out which tuner they had since there are a number of them available for our trucks from Bully.

 

I appreciate your honest info. I am a DSP user on my 08 Hemi 1500. It has 4 tunes in the latest update. 87/91/MPG/93octane. I have used the 93 since day one. Occasionally the 91 if I can't get 93 octane fuel. When I was driving 80 miles round trip to work which was 70% hwy and 30% city, I averaged about 19.7mpg in the summer and about 18mpg in the winter. The hwy miles were fairly of hilly so it could have been better on flat ground. I can feel the 25hp gain that they claim. This was with the MDS off due to my Magnaflow cat-back (MDS sounds bad with loud pipes). Now that I have a job about 3.7 miles from the house, I get 12mpg. Mainly because the engine barely gets hot enough to open the thermostat.
With the mds on @ 65mph on flat highway, I have gotten 24.2mpg. But there is not much flat hwy around here. Since I have a lighter 2wd 1500, I don't expect your 2500 4x4 to get near the MPG that I do.
That being said, I feel pretty confident that your results sound about right. I do think that a little of the MPG improvement may have come from the resetting of the adaptive memory in the PCM when installing the tune. This is normal as well.
I am glad to hear that you are happy with the unit. Like you mentioned, there is very little real world feedback on the Bullydog system for gas engines.
The only thing that I see that it doesn't need it the ability to change gear ratio's. Since the PCM gets it speed readings from the sensor in the differential and the tone wheel, it doesn't matter what gear you run, it reads off of tire rotations, so tire size is the only speedo correction required.
Anyway, thanks again for your real world info. I am subscribing to this thread to keep up to date on how things go.

 

I am debating buying a bullydog for my 09 hemi cc 1500 4x4. It's either the triple dog or hemi gt plus. I tow a camper that weighs around 5,000lbs. I want more power and better mileage.

 

Ok just an update, I have logged enough miles now to confirm that my truck has indeed picked up about a couple mpg's more. I am making more power to the ground now too. Would recommend the 40430 as another option to the tried and true Diablo and Superchips tuners.

Has nothing at all to do with the thread, but entertaining none the less:

 

Has anyone tried or ever heard about Banks Automind 66108 for 02-09 ram hemis? They're about $350 and seem as if it may be the answer we're all looking for. After all I've read good/bad about dsp, bully dog hemi gt & triple dog, superchips. Banks is what I'm thinking. If I can talk my wife into it, I may be back on here in a couple weeks giving my .02
Amirite?

 

Isnt the automind basically a rebadged superchips? They look identical except for different colors and stickers.