Soapweed said:
LazyWP said:
I would challenge any of you to find a nicer ride then my 06 Dodge, We got one of the last 5.9s and it is a total power house. The ranch owns a 91 Dodge with a Cummins, and after I got into the pump on it, it might pull with a straight 7.3 Ford. If you want reliability, go with the Cummins. If you want power of that era, you need to do a little work on it.
My ol' 1997 Ford F350 with a 7.3 is head and shoulders a better puller than our 1998 Dodge one ton diesel. Even with a full load of cows on a 24' trailer, I have to set the cruise on the Ford to keep from going past the speed limit. With the Dodge you have to keep whippin' and spurrin' to make any time at all.
Soapweed, your Ford could pull better if it had a lower speed rear
end ratio than the Dodge. Your Ford most likely has 4:10 gear
ratios and the Dodge perhaps 3:73 or higher. Mr. FH used to pay
real attention to this and only bought pickups with 4:10 gear ratio.
We had a real good puller, a 1967 Ford with a 352 engine and
4:56 gear ratio. It would pull a trailer over the Big Horn mountains
just as fast as it would run on the flat. It would be interesting to know
what your 1997 has vs your Dodge. Maybe you can get Kosmo to
check them out.
One other little thing, we bought a 1973 Ford 2WD with high gears
in the rear end; the dealer said to take it and try it--a good head wind
and that pickup could barely go, so Mr. FH had the gears changed to
3:56 and we picked up more power and better fuel mileage.
This was when we lived
40 miles from town and was easy to check. Then we noticed all the
smaller cars that got good mileage had lower gear ratios. FWIW