Oregon Road Trip Leg 2 - World War II Bombsite and the Oregon Coast - 2015 Ford F-150 Long-Term Road

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Oregon Road Trip Leg 2 - World War II Bombsite and the Oregon Coast - 2015 Ford F-150 Long-Term Road Test

We took our 2015 Ford F-150 up the Oregon Coast to Washington, and on the way we visited a little-known World War II landmark near Brookings, Oregon.

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bankerdanny

So only slightly better mileage empty than Travis got in the Ram towing over 5,000 pounds.

Hyundai got sued for a lot of money when its cars failed to deliver advertised mileage. Seems to me that Ford is at risk for something like this too. I have yet to see an EB equipped vehicle achieve the EPA ratings in any magazine/website LT test.

dgcamero

At this point I would be bringing the truck to the dealer because you should be able to achieve the epa highway rating at 60 mph. I wonder what you guys would achieve on the fuel economy loop test?

subytrojan

Great LT update, Dan! I learned a lot! Thanks!

socal_eric

It would be great to see a couple more tanks of premium go into the truck to see if the adaptive tables update but it is encouraging to see that it may be able to run on regular unleaded with the stock calibration in the powertrain controller without taking a hit in economy. Even though it sounds like a sweet operating engine, with the average economy you've been seeing it would be a bigger sting in the wallet if premium was required.

I haven't been keeping up much on the new 2.7L, but that is a good point about having the dealer check out the truck. Maybe at the next oil change mention the economy hasn't been great and see if Ford release any powertrain controller (software) updates.

emajor

Is there really any point in bringing it to the dealer because of the lower than expected fuel economy? The honest service writer will probably tell you that there is nothing wrong with the vehicle, that it is operating within designed specs, that FE varies with use.

The honest Ford engineer will probably tell you "no, it doesn't easily achieve EPA ratings in the real world and wasn't designed to. You see, we needed to maintain accelerative and towing performance while getting nice numbers in the EPA test, because that's what sells trucks and keeps us within government fuel economy mandates. Your real-world fuel costs are of a distant second concern. Because this is America and you're going to buy these things whether they hit EPA ratings or not."

actualsize

I've been thinking about this a long time, and I chose the F-150 for this trip in order to get a better idea (oh, the irony) of this EcoBoost fuel economy shortfall -- as if 16,000 miles of randomized data wasn't enough.

I think the trips up the mountain to my dad's place and the bombsite did spoil the chances of a new best tank, but maybe only by a single mpg at the most. There are three more tanks to go on this trip, and I've got other things in the works in the near future. And no, I don't think this is anything that requires a dealer visit. This is what it does, I think.

emajor

Dan, as a way estimating how sensitive that fuel economy was to the trips up the mountain, assume something terrible like 10 mpg for all the miles off-pavement, then back-calculate the on-pavement economy. For instance, if the side trip was 15 miles each way (30 total) and you did, say 10 trips up-n-down the mountain at six miles each, you have a total of 90 miles at 10mpg. My maths says the on-highway miles left on that fill-up would be 23.3 mpg.

socal_eric

I wouldn't propose taking the truck in to service just for lower than expected economy as it's pretty clear a small engine with small turbochargers that's in boost in a big vehicle will use fuel, but since there are apparently other drivers seeing better mileage it wouldn't hurt at the next oil change to see if there's been any powertrain controller updates.

Just to give a real world example of what software alone can change, I've bought two new SVT Focus models, one a first year '02 model and later a final year '04. The '02-03 cars were rated at 21/25, 23 combined (pre-'08 EPA numbers). The fuel mileage was not great on my '02 but over multiple computer reflashes to address drivability issues the real-world mileage improved (Ford had issues meeting drivability targets while maintaining LEV (Low Emission Vehicle) emission standards due to the use of a long-tube 4-2-1 header and only one underbody catalyst).

For '04 Ford had retested the SVT Focus using the latest software calibration (tune) and it returned 21/28, 23 combined, which was an improvement of 3 mpg on the highway. And unlike my '02 car which started out pretty dismal the '04 easily met and exceeded those numbers.

paulbananna

Informative and entertaining read, thank you. As a side note:
I wanted to point out the US mainland had been bombed by the Japanese with one of their "Balloon bombs". Sadly, on May 5, 1945, seven people were killed when they encountered one of these balloons.

Paul B