Mountain Driving

[skiwhiz]

Purchased Cass A Traveller motor home Ford V10 Automatic. Would like hints for driving/barking in mountains, passes etc, all help and suggestions welcome ??????

[Dadio24]

Enjoy the trip down as well as up. Go slow, the additional 10 minutes to your travel time should not be a big deal. It's better to be late than never! I have a V10 with Tow/Haul button and you it all the time. Texas to Colorado and 2 passes. I just go slow up and down. Give dog peanut butter smeared on a paper plate and causes their ears to pop due to the swallowing. Everyone is happy and safe. We usually drink a bottle of water and chew a tums for each 2500' in elevation we gain to stop the altitude headaches.

[ReneeG]

lonewolf80 wrote:
skiwhiz, a couple of years ago I toured around Mt. Rushmore and the Black Hills of SD with my then 2011 35 ft. Georgetown gasser. I was also pulling my wife's 4K lb. Kia on our 500 lb. dolly. The worst part of ascending a hill of any nature, no less some of the 9% grades around Mt. Rushmore is to have to start from a standing stop. That is exactly what happened to me, plus having to make a left-hand turn from a traffic signal to start the ascent. The Ford V10 is an amazing engine, and we climbed the grade between 35-40 MPH and the tach between 4500-5000. Easy as all get out, except for the folks behind me on this newly paved two-lane grade. Oh well.

Going down 9% grades, again encountered in and around Mt. Rushmore, Deadwood, Sturgis, SD I didn't rely on the Tow Haul Mode. I am a firm believer in using the gear to go down the hill as the gear the automatic chose to go up. So what I'm saying is I downshifted the tranny myself to the gear needed to keep it the speed I needed based on what I was comfortable with going down such steep decline's.
Even my DW who can be a scary cat barely winced. Did I say the V10 is an amazing engine already? When going down almost any prolonged decline and if braking is needed to check down your speed you "stab" the brakes somewhat hard (don't lock them up!) to drop speed. Never ride the brake to try to slowly reduce speed. Practice your technique on smaller hills so it becomes second nature to use your tranmission and brakes as a team.

Your rig will take you up any hill you encounter, and taking your time, downshift to a slower speed, get you comfortably down the hill too. Take your time, don't worry about the traffic behind you (when possible, move right) and you will be fine.

Great information. I know he was asking about his Class A, but most, if not all Class C's have the V10 if they are not a Chevy. A good Class C will most likely be our next RV when we get too old to want to mess with hooking up the FW.

[2oldman]

he's gone

[lonewolf80]

skiwhiz, a couple of years ago I toured around Mt. Rushmore and the Black Hills of SD with my then 2011 35 ft. Georgetown gasser. I was also pulling my wife's 4K lb. Kia on our 500 lb. dolly. The worst part of ascending a hill of any nature, no less some of the 9% grades around Mt. Rushmore is to have to start from a standing stop. That is exactly what happened to me, plus having to make a left-hand turn from a traffic signal to start the ascent. The Ford V10 is an amazing engine, and we climbed the grade between 35-40 MPH and the tach between 4500-5000. Easy as all get out, except for the folks behind me on this newly paved two-lane grade. Oh well.

Going down 9% grades, again encountered in and around Mt. Rushmore, Deadwood, Sturgis, SD I didn't rely on the Tow Haul Mode. I am a firm believer in using the gear to go down the hill as the gear the automatic chose to go up. So what I'm saying is I downshifted the tranny myself to the gear needed to keep it the speed I needed based on what I was comfortable with going down such steep decline's.
Even my DW who can be a scary cat barely winced. Did I say the V10 is an amazing engine already? When going down almost any prolonged decline and if braking is needed to check down your speed you "stab" the brakes somewhat hard (don't lock them up!) to drop speed. Never ride the brake to try to slowly reduce speed. Practice your technique on smaller hills so it becomes second nature to use your tranmission and brakes as a team.

Your rig will take you up any hill you encounter, and taking your time, downshift to a slower speed, get you comfortably down the hill too. Take your time, don't worry about the traffic behind you (when possible, move right) and you will be fine.

[ReneeG]

2oldman wrote:

skiwhiz wrote:
Would like hints for driving/barking in mountains, passes etc, all help and suggestions welcome ??????

Not sure what to do about the barking.

Leave it to the experts . . . the dog.

[2oldman]

skiwhiz wrote:
Would like hints for driving/barking in mountains, passes etc, all help and suggestions welcome ??????

Not sure what to do about the barking.

[btilfan]

As a flatlander (Nebraska) my whole life I too worried about mountain driving. Just follow the advice on this thread and you'll be fine. Up is easy just keep it slow and let the tranny find the gear. going down keep it slow and use lower gear, in most cased just turning off the overdrive will do it. set a speed you don't want to exceed, in my case it was 40 - 45. then when you get to that speed brake hard to about 25 - 30 and repeat. I have now driven I80 and I70 both directions at least 4 times from Omaha to west coast in a gasser and enjoy doing it.

[FloridaRosebud]

Dale.Traveling wrote:

ssthrd wrote:
Be prepared for the hills by being in the right gear just before going up/down steep slopes.,,,

Best advice yet. Start out slow and get in a low gear before drop over the crest of a descent. Hit the top of a 3 mile, 8% grade at 65 MPH and your going to have problems getting the speed down later.

Best way to learn and get a feel is to stick with the 18 wheelers for climbs and descent. As a beginner I would advise you to manually downshift for now. Play with the auto shift on the gentler descents. For the climbs keep the RPM up, as high as 4500 RPM, on the climbs. The high RMP has the engine coolant/oil and transmission oil moving at a high rate which helps to keep both cool. The engine is electronically limited to 5250 RPM and won't let you do anything that will exceed that number including manual down shifts.

If you do have to brake be aggressive and get the speed down fast then get off the breaks to allow them to cool. Long soft braking should be avoided as you want to avoid - THIS

Agree....this is great advice. I learned going down the grade on I-77 going from VA to NC....not 8%, but steep enough. The first time I could smell the brakes at the bottom. The next year I started slow, had the tow/haul on, and was MUCH easier and less stressful.

Al

[Dale_Traveling]

ssthrd wrote:
Be prepared for the hills by being in the right gear just before going up/down steep slopes.,,,

Best advice yet. Start out slow and get in a low gear before drop over the crest of a descent. Hit the top of a 3 mile, 8% grade at 65 MPH and your going to have problems getting the speed down later.

Best way to learn and get a feel is to stick with the 18 wheelers for climbs and descent. As a beginner I would advise you to manually downshift for now. Play with the auto shift on the gentler descents. For the climbs keep the RPM up, as high as 4500 RPM, on the climbs. The high RMP has the engine coolant/oil and transmission oil moving at a high rate which helps to keep both cool. The engine is electronically limited to 5250 RPM and won't let you do anything that will exceed that number including manual down shifts.

If you do have to brake be aggressive and get the speed down fast then get off the breaks to allow them to cool. Long soft braking should be avoided as you want to avoid - THIS

[valhalla360]

ReneeG wrote:
Our F250 V10 was a 6.8L.

I believe the ford V10 was always 6.8L. They had different valve configurations and some other things but displacement was pretty much constant.

When I mentioned the 7.3L Diesel it was referring to the older Ford Diesel which is a V8 and untreated to the V10 other than both went into Fords.

[ReneeG]

DrewE wrote:
For climbing hills, don't be afraid to push the V10 and let it rev up. Its powerband is at relatively high RPMs, and it's perfectly capable of running there for quite some time, even if it sounds like it's a giant over-caffeinated bumble bee thrashing about.

ReneeG wrote:

valhalla360 wrote:

Our 2008 F250 V10 does and it works great. It would be shocking if a much newer MH doesn't.

Well, I learned something new. We had a 1999 V10 F250. No tow/ haul mode, but when we bought our 2011 F350 diesel, it came with a tow/ haul mode and a tap of the break slows it down.

It depends on the transmission (and that depends on the year of the vehicle). The four speed Ford transmission did not have tow/haul, and the button on the shifter is correctly labeled "O/D off". The 5 speed and newer transmissions do have tow/haul instead, and it works well.

A motorhome is always hauling, even if it's not towing, since it's a heavy load and a lot of air resistance. As such, it's not at all unreasonable to always use tow/haul mode if you have it.

Our F250 V10 was a 6.8L.

[valhalla360]

ReneeG wrote:
Well, I learned something new. We had a 1999 V10 F250. No tow/ haul mode, but when we bought our 2011 F350 diesel, it came with a tow/ haul mode and a tap of the break slows it down.

Had a 1992 with the 7.3 diesel...Naturally Aspirated (no turbo) or exhaust brake. On flat land it was great. Awesome MPG. In the mountains, it was a total pig. Going up mountains it would lose lots of power at altitude and it didn't like lots of RPM (unlike the V10). Going downhill, it offered no engine or exhaust braking.

[georgelesley]

ReneeG wrote:
I believe the gasser doesn't have the Tow Haul mode where you can tap the breaks and slow it down like diesels. When we had a V10 truck and towed a travel trailer, we had to do the slow lane with the semi's and slow it way down, then pump the brakes at the end to keep them from seizing up.

Our V-10 gasser does indeed have the tow haul that does downshift with brake taps. Best thing the OP can do is learn to use and live the tow haul feature. Also important to start the down grade at a slow safe speed, not fast.

[DrewE]

For climbing hills, don't be afraid to push the V10 and let it rev up. Its powerband is at relatively high RPMs, and it's perfectly capable of running there for quite some time, even if it sounds like it's a giant over-caffeinated bumble bee thrashing about.

ReneeG wrote:

valhalla360 wrote:

Our 2008 F250 V10 does and it works great. It would be shocking if a much newer MH doesn't.

Well, I learned something new. We had a 1999 V10 F250. No tow/ haul mode, but when we bought our 2011 F350 diesel, it came with a tow/ haul mode and a tap of the break slows it down.

It depends on the transmission (and that depends on the year of the vehicle). The four speed Ford transmission did not have tow/haul, and the button on the shifter is correctly labeled "O/D off". The 5 speed and newer transmissions do have tow/haul instead, and it works well.

A motorhome is always hauling, even if it's not towing, since it's a heavy load and a lot of air resistance. As such, it's not at all unreasonable to always use tow/haul mode if you have it.