hi guys i have been reading for several months now since i bought my dodge and it seems like you guys give some pretty great answers to problems around here. i bought this truck to tow a 29 foot travel trailer that weighs 4400 pounds. pretty light. my problem is when i get hooked up it feels pretty week. i have to lay into it pretty hard to get moving with any haste. when running down the road around 60 on the highway the egts are around 1000 plus at around 65 to 70 they like to hover around 1200 if you start climbing a hill and want to maintain 65 they have climbed to 1300 once i saw 1400 briefly before letting out of it. this is my first deisel truck and i was a little worried about egts that high for long preiods of time.the truck has strait pipe out the back and a k&n cold air intake. the pipe from turbo back is pretty rusty.its now at 135k while running down the road its getting about 6 to 10 mpg. 14.5 avg without trailer. travel meeter show 16.5 i hope i have provided enough info to get us going and i look forward to some input.

 

what year???

 

its a 2000 3500 4X4 drw

 

hmm, thats kind of low milage unloaded. I havent towed a whole bunch, but our 2k trailer with a ranger on it didnt cause the egts to go up that high.

 

what temps are you seeing while towing. this truck has been quite a headache since purchasing... oil leaks-- repaired and leaking again, tranny was shuddering when shifting when towing and torque converter locking and unlocking a lot- rebuild tranny becouse clutches and bands burnt new converter-old one was burnt.new exh manifold, old one warped and blew out gasket while towing. boost pressures look good 10-20 while towing on the highway. good loking truck but its frustrating. have you ever towed in the mountains. im worried about this high egt and low power situation getting worse in the mountains.

 

I havent towed in the mountains, but I have towed in southern ohio and in a few places there are some pretty decent grades. The highest I have seen it go is about 1100-1150 and I was stepping on it (1000 max unloaded). Your boost numbers are pretty normal. Have you had a fuel pressure gauge on your rig? As for your tranny shifting a lot take a look at your battery connections. I havent had any problems with them, but several guys on here have fixed tranny hunting problems by cleaning the corrosion off the battery cables and the ground cable too.

 

hmm your number seem little lower than mine. i would feel better around yours. no i havent checked fuel pressure yet. i have a fuel pressure guage in my podbut it is non functional. and on the tranny yeah we cleaned the terminals and several grounds around the batteries. thats an ongoing problem the dealer i purchased it from is looking into. its a lot worse when the lights are on and the heater motor is on high. this week they are looking into the alternator and pcm and ecm grounds and such. gotta get it going good soon. vacation to colorado coming in a few months....

 

do you have a programmer on this truck???

also since you bought it used Id be wondering if someone sold it with the programmer still installed. do you have alot of black smoke from the exhaust???

 

Drew, if he had a programmer on the truck, wouldnt it accelerate better? (I have never towed with one) It does make sense of the high egt's though.

 

it has been reflashed at the dealer while trying to figure out the tranny issue. i dont know if they just did the tranny or whole thing.i do have a hypertech programmer for it that i tried. didnt seem to make much of a power diff. and egts were virtualy the same. only a little higher than stock. in stock mode only a little black smoke at full throtle. with proggramer more smoke at full or right near full