FACTS about Ford V10 Engine Characteristics and 5 Star Tuning...

[gmtech16450yz]

Originally Posted by Long & Winding road

Yep, that was me about the headlights. Yours looks awesome.

I went the plug and play option with replacement LED bulbs for headlights and drving (fog) lights. They work well... much better than stock which is what I was going for.

But I like the Idea of having them come on at night on auto (and turning off automatically when engine is off).

Now that my LED's have a cooling fan in them when I get out of the RV I can hear them running so I turn them off..... So that kinda works for me (for now).

I also like the idea of having the lower driving (fog) lights used as my DRL. Would this be hard for the avg Joe to do?

Really easy. Simply find the wires going to the DRL's, splice off of them or cut them, depending on what you want, and run the wire to your fog lights. The stock DRL's have a mind of their own though, they sometimes turn off when the headlights are on. They sometimes turn off with too much load too, Ford's "Smart Junction Box" isn't very smart in my opinion!

[Long & Winding road]

GMTech.... you would the perfect person to help us mod our windsheild wipers on the older axis/ vegas models. See current thread " Windshild Wiper-Drivers Side".

Looks like on your they changed the wiper arms. My DS on on top of the PS. but yours is just opposite.

Does yours work well? Clears most of the windshield (esp in front of the driver)?

Perhaps we can just switch to your arms and it would work better?? Any linkage modes we can perform?

Thanks.

[gmtech16450yz]

Originally Posted by Long & Winding road

GMTech.... you would the perfect person to help us mod our windsheild wipers on the older axis/ vegas models. See current thread " Windshild Wiper-Drivers Side".

Looks like on your they changed the wiper arms. My DS on on top of the PS. but yours is just opposite.

Does yours work well? Clears most of the windshield (esp in front of the driver)?

Perhaps we can just switch to your arms and it would work better?? Any linkage modes we can perform?

Thanks.

The wipers suck. If I didn't live in California I'd probably ditch the whole system and start over. Sorry! All I did to mine was a little bending of the arms and carefully adjusting the position on the shafts to get somewhat decent coverage. It's kind of a waste of time messing with them imho.

[ducksface]

Thanks.
I'll save the tuner money for some mechanical enhancements. You've saved me a bunch of bucks.
If they made an effective, marketed, positive pressure system, I'd have one tomorrow.
I don't want to 'one off' a blower or turbo.

Headlights:
My 2018 turns off after what seems like ten minutes. So I just leave the lights on at all times.

[Long & Winding road]

Originally Posted by gmtech16450yz

The wipers suck. If I didn't live in California I'd probably ditch the whole system and start over. Sorry! All I did to mine was a little bending of the arms and carefully adjusting the position on the shafts to get somewhat decent coverage. It's kind of a waste of time messing with them imho.

Ok, thanks. I thought about bending mine some. Did you just put in a vise and bend a little or did you have to heat it up?

Have you ever see the wiper arms with the lever action on one side? Can something like this be adapted to our application? (For the avg Joe without more than like 8 man hours and less than $200. For you anything is possible - lol).

[Forest Grump]

So if I am understanding you right for steep mountain grades at high altitude keep your pedal above 90% for PE and a gear which doesn’t take you much above 3,000 RPM unless you can pull the grade in a higher gear and keep it around 3,000 RPM. I’m thinking about the long steep grade on 395 from Bishop to Mammoth and the the even higher grade from Mammoth to June Lake. Summits are at 8’000’ and above and outside temperatures as high as 100. I’m not worried about PE as much as I am about engine temperature. I’m pretty sure we will detach the toad in Bishop and keep the chassis AC off and maybe start the generator and run the coach AC.

I have a 16% downgrade from Big Bear to Lucerne and I will use tow haul and have the toad in tow. Coming up we usually detach the toad and turn the AC off. I usually pick my gear and just try to go up in second at around 3400 RPM’s and 20 to 35 mph depending on the slope. I did this a week ago at 98 with no problems, summit is around 7,000’. I try to keep the pedal constant except for the really steep hairpins.

[gdurden188]

So I have a Thor Windsport (Class A), 22,000# F53 chassis, V-10 power plant. I use a pass through device and laptop with Roush tuner on my F150 3.5 eco boost. I'm not adept enough to know what parameters I need to accomplish, but would like to know if (1) is there a tuning program available that is similar to the Roush that I can use for my RV, (2) parameters you have stated that I could adjust to peak engine performance?

[Wiz70]

Originally Posted by gmtech16450yz

I found a couple logs showing data relating to whether the V10 "Likes to rev" so I thought I'd preemptively try to answer those questions...

The first one shows engine noise. The red trace is from my knock sensor system, it's basically reading noise in the ~6.4kHz range, listening for engine knock. Notice the "floor" of the readings, they start to rise at around 4000 rpm, and rise exponentially around 4700rpm. If I let that shift go any higher, that engine noise would also keep rising exponentially.

Mechanical engine noise is obviously an indication of engine stress. (I'm not talking about exhaust or intake noise.) Engine stress goes up in just about every single internal combustion engine exponentially. It can be at all different levels obviously, but the thing to remember is an increase of just a couple hundred rpm can mean engine stresses can actually DOUBLE. The mechanical engine noise in a late model Ford V10 goes up significantly at 4k rpm and continues to rise.


The second picture shows the power curve. (this log is from a totally stock engine.) Notice the green "MAF lb/min" trace in the bottom section of the chart. At 4500rpm it actually starts to go DOWN. That means even though the engine is spinning faster, it's actually starting to take in LESS air. It's literally suffocating. (There are a dozen reasons for that. I'll put a couple pics below to show just one of them.) You can see the torque curve, it of course starts to drop off. What you don't see is HP, but you can tell what it's doing by looking at the air mass and also the Absolute Load. It's the white trace in the 4th section of the chart. It starts to drop off at 4k rpm. By not quite 4600rpm it's dropped 10%! So airflow and absolute load are dropping at again, an exponential rate, so what's the airflow and load (directly relates to power output) going to be at say 5k rpm? The answer is "Not enough to be there". lol.

I haven't even gotten into the factors of it being a V10, crank stroke, cam profiles and cam timing, engine calibrations, ignition timing, etc, etc. Don't try to put too much emphasis on it being an overhead cam engine, that's not a big factor and actually was (my opinion here) done for marketing reasons more than actual functionality. GM has proved over and over that pushrod V8's are a more effective design. Ford finally listened on the new engine. Overhead cams are awesome in 4 bangers. They're pretty good in V6's. So-so in V8's and actually a stupid idea in a V10. You want to see a (relatively) big engine that likes to rev? Try just about every GM LS/LT engine made, and they have pushrods! I'll run my 800+ hp overdriven supercharger (more drag, not rev "happy") 6.2L V8 to 6k all day long and it will like it! My Ford V10 would take a healthy dose of nitrous to even get close to turning 6k. The bottom line is this, the Ford V10 is an engine that not only isn't "happy" revving over 4500rpm, it really shouldn't be run much over 4000rpm. That's pretty "diesel like" for a gas engine.

So can we at least kill the "Ford V10's love to rev" comments on here? It's simply not factual.

**************************************************

Freedom Elite 22e. Took RV for first 2700 mile trip after purchasing it. Trip included elevations upto 9000' and down to 1000'. Gas was a minimum 87oct to 91oct.

Air cleaner "Spectre" which was cleaned and oiled per spec prior to trip.

Problem: On quick acceleration from stop, engine lurches. When trans down shifts for steep hills, engine lurches... (numerous occurrences where engine revved to 5krpm, which I quickly disengaged speed control) After up to speed and slow acceleration, no noticeable lurching occurs...

Suggestions for a fix????? Thx

[Tom Brown]

What is the best RPM to run the V10 at for fuel economy

[16ACE27]

Originally Posted by tom brown

what is the best rpm to run the v10 at for fuel economy

1833

[gmtech16450yz]

Sorry to be awol guys but I'm having a hard enough time keeping up with the "other" RV forum I posted a similar thread on. You can look there if you're interested in this info...

FACTS about Ford V10 Engine Characteristics and 5 Star Tuning... - iRV2 Forums

[Skip 500]

So, what is the best way to increase your fuel mileage?

[Long & Winding road]

Originally Posted by Skip 500

So, what is the best way to increase your fuel mileage?

Drive slower and accelerate slowly. Im not trying to me a smart @xx.

I tend to drive 70 - 75 on the interstates and the speed limit elsewhere.

But may RV'er drive at 62 - 65 mph max and they see about 1 or 2 mpg increase on avg. We have so much wind resistance so really slowing down is the cheapest thing to do to increase MPG.

Im sure some will say try the 5 star tune (or some other tune) plus Cold air intake etc. But they are costly and you might not see any increase in MPG or at best 1 mpg more (IMO).

[ducksface]

Originally Posted by Skip 500

So, what is the best way to increase your fuel mileage?

Spend 12 bucks on a Bluetooth OBD reader and 4 bucks on TORQUE pro app.
It reads and tells you instantaneous and avg mpg plus exact gph readings.
Then experiment by going different speeds on the same road.

It's 16 bucks to find our what's real vs seat of the pants justifications.

http://www.thorforums.com/forums/f4/...tml#post184010
(post #9 shows the mpg and other fuel related data on a phone screen)

[JamieGeek]

Note that in GMTech's post on iRV2 he had determined that the sweet spot for mpg is around 2500 rpm. At 2000 rpm he thought that the engine was working a little too hard causing a higher consumption rate than 2500 rpm.

Thus driving slower may not yield the best mpg (this is independent of wind as wind will be a larger factor when its strong).

[Oneilkeys]

Originally Posted by ducksface

Spend 12 bucks on a Bluetooth OBD reader and 4 bucks on TORQUE pro app.
It reads and tells you instantaneous and avg mpg plus exact gph readings.
Then experiment by going different speeds on the same road.

It's 16 bucks to find our what's real vs seat of the pants justifications.

http://www.thorforums.com/forums/f4/...tml#post184010
(post #9 shows the mpg and other fuel related data on a phone screen)

I have one hooked permanently to my OBD port and it really makes you aware of how much your gas mileage goes down with a heavy foot and increased speed as well as the effect of wind and hills. It will also give you a ton of other info, if you want it, as well as the ability to read and zero out engine fault codes and the engine problem light. Invaluable to figure out whether the engine light is a real problem or a minor issue and reset it.

[Muggs]

Originally Posted by JamieGeek

Note that in GMTech's post on iRV2 he had determined that the sweet spot for mpg is around 2500 rpm. At 2000 rpm he thought that the engine was working a little too hard causing a higher consumption rate than 2500 rpm.

Thus driving slower may not yield the best mpg (this is independent of wind as wind will be a larger factor when its strong).

This matches what I see. Under 2000 rpm seems to be almost lugging with trailer.

[SANDDOG]

Originally Posted by ducksface

Spend 12 bucks on a Bluetooth OBD reader and 4 bucks on TORQUE pro app.
It reads and tells you instantaneous and avg mpg plus exact gph readings.
Then experiment by going different speeds on the same road.

It's 16 bucks to find our what's real vs seat of the pants justifications.

http://www.thorforums.com/forums/f4/...tml#post184010
(post #9 shows the mpg and other fuel related data on a phone screen)

Wow great idea thanks for the link I’d love to know what my Miramar 34 footer does with gas mileage. I do not push the pedal and I Hand shift as much as possible hoping for 10 miles to the gallon

[Lottomunch]

Hello. First post in here but I've been reading for sometime. Let me tell you, I've been a fan of various forums for the last 20 years and this thread is one of my top 3. It's a flipping goldmine. Thank you GMTech for sharing your knowledge.

I've read it at least 3 times and have two questions.

Based on the first post you made a statement that it's extremely hard to hear this engine knock. I don't necessarily hear a knock but in my 2000 Excursion I hear this real quiet rolling ping while I'm climbing big freeway speed hills with my two loads (4500 flatbed trailer and 6000 lb travel trailer). THIS SOUND DRIVES ME CRAZY and messes with my head making me drive slower than I should have to. If it's not a knock could it be pinging? (I always thought they were similar/same).
2. I've regeared the thing and am super happy to hear the rpm numbers you all discuss in the thread. As luck would have it I'm spot on. On the flats at 60 mph I tow in OD (fourth gear) at 2400 rpm gear. While climbing a huge hill at 60 mph I'm in third gear, 3500 rpm, and at 2/3 throttle. I LOVE the fact that I'm not full throttle and at optimal torque for the motor but I think the problem is that I'm never full throttle so I NEVER get into power enrichment. Would a tune that simply moving the power enrichment trigger down to say 50% and 10 seconds might solve my problem?

O by the way.....it seems to ping alot on 87 and while significantly less on 91 octane it's till there.

Am I on track?