Community Forums

ckostner · 10-05-2018, 04:40 AM

I am pretty new to the market, but i see alot oh hitch discussion... why isnt everyone using:
https://www.amazon.com/Andersen-Hitc...anderson+hitch

it has worked great for us. granted, i never used one of the older style hitches, but having a regular box denali this has done well on our measly 8 trips since april when we got the 5er.

ijon · 10-05-2018, 05:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rte1985

You won’t even know that trailer is back there! Nice truck and happy travels!

He is right about the trailer. Go big or go home.

8210T · 10-05-2018, 09:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by UtahEngineer

Replaced the lower quality factory Goodyear Wrangler SR-A tires with Michelin Defender LTX M/S tires. It will be interesting to see if these new tires live up to the high rating they have for traction and higher miles before replacement.

Good choice. The factory tires are not rated for towing/heavy duty use, and are more of a passenger tire. Those who use them should go to a certified scale, fully loaded with trailer attached. you may find that you are exceeding the weight rating of the tire. I have used the "E" load rated Michelins for years, and love them. I use nothing else!

Kimaroo · 10-08-2018, 08:17 AM

It’s awesom!

redhooker · 10-08-2018, 06:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jshopes81

Hit the nail square on the head. Im not sure what other way that could have been interpreted. Gm makes a great truck but the "extras" that have been put on all the new trucks cut mileage and shorten engine life.

I write this with great sorrow, but the L5P (2017 and up) is the end of deletes and tuning for the foreseeable future. Ford and Ram are supposedly next. The new ecm is locked and un-tuneable. Also if you replace a part that links to the ecm (fuel pump, emission parts, ect) you will need a dealer to reflash the new part number in allowing the ecm to communicate. Soon we will all be locked out of working on our own vehicles altogether. There are aftermarket complete ecms available now but once you switch you have to be self sufficient as you are no longer running a factory program.

Sad but the end of an era is upon us it seems. I will enjoy my LML as long as I can.

Jshopes81 · 10-08-2018, 07:42 PM

The aftermarket needs time to react.

UtahEngineer · 10-08-2018, 08:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by redhooker

I write this with great sorrow, but the L5P (2017 and up) is the end of deletes and tuning for the foreseeable future. Ford and Ram are supposedly next. The new ecm is locked and un-tuneable. Also if you replace a part that links to the ecm (fuel pump, emission parts, ect) you will need a dealer to reflash the new part number in allowing the ecm to communicate. Soon we will all be locked out of working on our own vehicles altogether. There are aftermarket complete ecms available now but once you switch you have to be self sufficient as you are no longer running a factory program.

Sad but the end of an era is upon us it seems. I will enjoy my LML as long as I can.

The auto industry’s ECM lockout encryption coding is being driven by the US government and mandated emissions compliance ... not the auto manufacturer’s future parts sales. The government is simply trying to stop those circumventing the emissions systems on vehicles by rendering the vehicle inoperable. I am not stating my personal opinion on the matter ... just providing my personal insights.

powerboatr · 10-08-2018, 09:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by UtahEngineer

The auto industry’s ECM lockout encryption coding is being driven by the US government and mandated emissions compliance ... not the auto manufacturer’s future parts sales. The government is simply trying to stop those circumventing the emissions systems on vehicles by rendering the vehicle inoperable. I am not stating my personal opinion on the matter ... just providing my personal insights.

yep big brother is getting serious with fines and all kinds of liability to the manufacturers ...but watch and see if the factory starts coming out with "tunes" or enhancements..
mercruiser has been doing it for years, you can buy a tune to boost hp or other parameters.

you watch the aftermarket take a minute and start finding ways to adjust

BubbaChris · 10-27-2018, 06:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by UtahEngineer

Replaced the lower quality factory Goodyear Wrangler SR-A tires with Michelin Defender LTX M/S tires. It will be interesting to see if these new tires live up to the high rating they have for traction and higher miles before replacement.

I tow a 6K TT with a 2013 Ford Expedition. The first year was all about chasing serious wiggles going down the road. Getting our Andersen WDH properly installed and adding a hitch clamp were helpful, but the real improvement was ditching the P-series tires and getting the same Defender LTX you've added. The Ford's anti-sway system has not kicked in a single time since then. I'll trade a little noise and ride quality for stability any day.

Congrats on the new truck.

Best regards,
Chris

Grand Tour · 10-27-2018, 01:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by UtahEngineer

Our travel trailer only weighs 8,000 lbs loaded down, is not a 5vr, so this truck far surpasses our towing requirements. I previously towed our travel trailer with an F150 ... it would do it ... but nothing worse than sometimes feeling like the trailer is controlling you ... not the other way around as it should be.

Amen to that.

Good choice.

Cook-Den · 10-28-2018, 09:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by UtahEngineer

Broke down and purchased a 1-ton truck to tow our travel trailer.Attachment 219903

Curious, just ordered the same truck myself and would appreciate your feed back on your experiences with this truck. I,ll be pulling a 12000 lbs 5th wheel.

Thanks in advance for all feedback

UtahEngineer · 10-28-2018, 04:20 PM

It is a very nice truck ... but honestly ... I have a list of things I wish GM would have designed differently so I did not have to modify/ improve myself.

1. Location of the DEF fill spout. Location is under the hood on the passenger side against the firewall. Not sure if they could have designed a worse location for this. I purchased a $20 battery-operated pump to transfer from the Blue DEF 2.5 gallon plastic container to the fill spout location under the hood to avoid the filling mess I first experienced.

2. A factory cover for the transmission cooler. It is located in the center of the front bumper where there is an open hole and no protection. A rock could easily puncture the cooler and cause an unforeseeable problem while traveling. I added a black Putco grille style cover myself and actually looks like a factory part.

3. No factory leveling kit. The truck was 3.5 inches higher in the back than the front in stock form. I had to actually tilt my seat bottom down in the back to sit level while driving. Also had a hard time seeing vehicles in my rear view due to the butt-end of the truck being so much higher than the front. We all understand this is done so the truck sits level when you add the 3,500 lbs of payload to the back. But I fixed all of this by adding a quality leveling kit (with the proper spacers to drop the front differential returning the CV axles to the proper angles) ... and an aftermarket airbag self-leveling memory system to lift the back-end of the truck back up when a significant payload is added to the rear.

4. Still has the historically-weak GM steering system design. The tie rods are too small in my engineering opinion for a truck with a heavy diesel motor. The idler / pitman / center link steering system design is still the same system it has been for years ... known to be a wear problem. Already planning on replacing the entire steering linkage with a quality heavy-duty system this winter. Let’s hope GM upgrades this system in the new design 2020 models.

5. Tow hitch safety chain hole design. Smaller “S”-style safety chains does not fit the holes in the factory hitch design. I had to add hammer links to the hitch safety chain holes so the “S”-style safety chains could be attached easily instead of modifying each trailer’s safety chains.

My truck was significantly detuned for the first 1,000 miles. I was actually extremely disappointed at first how slow this truck was compared to my previous gas motor half-ton truck. But at 500 miles, then 1,000 miles, the truck became much faster. My father has a 2017 model with 15k miles on it and he verified his did the same thing. Before everyone asks ... I did properly break in the truck by not hammering on it as advised by GM.

Again ... I do like the truck ... and I can see why it has won the 3/4 - 1 ton truck shootout over the past couple years. Averages 17 to 20 mpg on the highway unloaded, which is great for something weighing almost 8,000 lbs. Averages 15 mpg around town unloaded. Averages 10-12 mpg pulling our 8,000 lb travel trailer with another 2,000 lbs of passengers and gear in the truck. The 910 ft-lbs of torque was not very evident until I put our travel trailer behind it ... then it made my previous half-ton look shameful by how fast it gets up to highway speed and how effortlessly it handles the load.

Grand Tour · 10-28-2018, 04:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by UtahEngineer

3. No factory leveling kit. The truck was 3.5 inches higher in the back than the front in stock form. I had to actually tilt my seat bottom down in the back to sit level while driving. Also had a hard time seeing vehicles in my rear view due to the butt-end of the truck being so much higher than the front. We all understand this is done so the truck sits level when you add the 3,500 lbs of payload to the back. But I fixed all of this by adding a quality leveling kit (with the proper spacers to drop the front differential returning the CV axles to the proper angles) ... and an aftermarket airbag self-leveling memory system to lift the back-end of the truck back up when a significant payload is added to the rear.

Don't forget to have the headlights correctly re-aimed.

Raising the front relative to the rear, will have the headlights aimed way too high.

And The factory alignment angle won't work anymore, because the position of the headlights is now higher than it was when the truck was stock, so if you try to use the factory alignment angle, the low beams will still be hitting the road too far in front of your vehicle. Your state laws should describe how many feet in front of the truck the high-intensity portion of the low beams should hit the ground, or verbiage similar to that. On some lifted trucks, I've had to just about bottom out the elevation adjustment to get them legal.

Quote:

...it made my previous half-ton look shameful by...how effortlessly it handles the load.

Amen. There's nothing quite like having enough truck. Congrats.

MtnTrek · 10-29-2018, 01:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by redhooker

I write this with great sorrow, but the L5P (2017 and up) is the end of deletes and tuning for the foreseeable future. Ford and Ram are supposedly next. The new ecm is locked and un-tuneable. Also if you replace a part that links to the ecm (fuel pump, emission parts, ect) you will need a dealer to reflash the new part number in allowing the ecm to communicate. Soon we will all be locked out of working on our own vehicles altogether. There are aftermarket complete ecms available now but once you switch you have to be self sufficient as you are no longer running a factory program.

Sad but the end of an era is upon us it seems. I will enjoy my LML as long as I can.

Every ERA brings happiness, some coming some going. Everyone should get to live next to a "clown" that bombs their CTD, 5" tubes, prom chips, deletes, yada, yada. Then annoyingly chooses to bust it off, bellowing black soot, and let it idle for 15 Min. before leaving for work. We (neighbors) asked him politely to refrain for a time. Be advised, some municipalities do have ordinances that are enforceable. Irresponsible individuals cause many of the freedoms we enjoy to dwindle.