Rod_Montana

My truck has always done reasonably well on fuel. Since I have a Smarty JR on the way, I decided to set up a real challenge. On December 20th, I filled the tank with winter #2 until level with the vent tube, no foam and drove it 542 indicated miles until tonight. Since my winter studs are smaller than my summer tires, I needed a correction factor for those indicated miles. Last week, I used a GPS, drove 55 miles indicated and got 53.7 on the GPS. 97.6%. Okay, that's 529 miles (actual) on that tank of fuel.

We're pretty deep in winter here in Montana, and a minumum of 244 miles was spent in 4WD, at least half of that pushing uphill and down through 4-8 inches on unplowed pavement. (Star Meadows Rd. is kind of low priority for the county).

Making every effort to spare the fuel during this tankful paid well as the overhead read 18.9mpg when I rolled up to the pump tonight. We need to factor that by 97.6% also. 18.44 - call it 18.4mpg for "real miles".

Took my time and squeezed 29.335 gallons until the foam cleared and fuel was again at the height of the vent tube.

18.03mpg. Not bad for a stocker

I parked the truck at the shop tonight and after the Smarty Jr. comes in, we'll load the mileage setting (SW#1), top off the tank and go as easy as possible once again.

I'll be very impressed if I get significant improvement over this.

tesla440

Wow I say that's really good for a stocker. I'm happy with 14-17mpg that I get. But I also 1/2 the time have a 5ft tall tag gate ramp attached to the truck & only drive 14 miles round trip back & forth to work.

Rod_Montana

A continuation of Part 1...

Smarty Jr received and SW #1 installed (40hp).

I had planned to wait until the gauges went in on Friday...but...you know how it goes. First step was to get the speedo to match the GPS. I physically measured the tires first. Diameter was 31.2" as measured with a pair of carpenter's squares. The ABS indicated it was previously set at 30.95" which worked very well with the 33x12.50/17 ST's that were on during the summer. Those are supposed to be 31.6" actual, so that tell's you how accurately the ABS calculates speed. I made a few runs down a straight and level with cruise set at 50.0 indicated and kept changing the tire size down until I got to 30.40 and that finally matched the GPS.

That done, I headed home...rolling along this snow-covered icy road in 6th with judicious pedal (like always - and exactly how I got the results in the first post).

Our road conditions in January are sort of, like...well think Siberia. It snows every day 1-2 inches, and this gets packed down into ice and the next days snow keeps the surface somewhat tractable. Plows clear away the snow every 2-3 days, except going up to my place on the mountain where it's more like every 3-5 days.

I was worried even the 40hp SW#1 would be too much, but a big surprise here. Drivability is much improved. Much easier to control wheel spin and even wheel hop. More on that in a moment. While cruising along the level sections in the valley, I reset the OHC to see what it would read. Normally, I get 19.2-19.5 in sixth at 1400-1500rpm. Now I was seeing 22.8 to 23.4. Yeah, right! What a laugh. Would that it be so. But, when we turned up Star Meadows Road, which was not plowed, and shifted into 4WD, things turned around. With stock SW, I lose about .5mpg on the OHC climbing up the series of benchs to the top. With Smarty, the mileage got hammered, big time. Knocked it all the way down to 16.8mpg. And coming down the next morning, I lost even more, reading 16.2mpg at the bottom. Shifted out of 4WD and back on the level, the mileage climbed rapidly back up the high teens by the end of the day.

So, initial impression says much better drivability, but more fuel needed in traction-challenged conditions. Thought about this for a while. A hypothesis might be this. Smarty fuels earlier and longer (timing and duration) than stock SW. We get improved torque at the first tiny bit of pedal (TPS) even with no boost. In stock SW, there is much less torque so you go deeper on the pedal and then boost kicks in and the tires get out of control (spin and hop). Here, there is limited boost, but enough torque to smartly (no pun intended) move the truck even before it pumps enough air to spin up the turbo. Whatever...smooth, strong and sure and much better than stock. If this level 1 SW could pass emissions, it would THE way to go from the factory.

Sound Impressions: Stronger resonating throb at 2k. (I've always liked the sound here in 5th and now it's even stronger.) More gutteral between 1300 and 1500. A slightly heavier rumble at idle.

Part II begins after the gauges are installed and I tank up again.

thejoker502

Rod,
Thank you for the writeup. I am looking forward to hearing the outcome as I too am looking at getting a SMARTY to do milage tests on it. I was going to wait untill spring though. With the temperature changes here in NY it is hard to keep things acurate. I can have MPG swings of 2 or more because of cold spells.

Thanks again,
John

JohnInNH

I find the Smarty changes my MPG on the overhead. I can get some wild #'s, 25 MPG.... w/o the Smarty 18 MPG on the overhead.

Soooo I hand calculate every tank since new. My Overhead with the smarty is between 2 and 3 MPG high.

The Smarty lets you give fuel sooner with a little peddle movement. Learning foot control and watching RPM is important. 1400 rpm with your foot into it a little will use a lot more fuel than at 1600 with a very light foot. 1600-1850 gives me the best MPG depending on the load. More load use higher RPM.. No load use lower RPM.

1/2 throttle w/o the Smarty loaded is about = to 1/5th- 1/4 throttle with the Smarty loaded. IMHO

On the flat and level the Smarty shines for MPG. :-) Acceleration is where it costs you MPG. It takes fuel to make power. Accelerating up hill in 4x4 in slush/mud will use some fuel .. now put a plow on it and watch it go down.

The Smarty will "let" you make the power to pull a hill at a lower RPM than the stock SW. So a hill stock you are floored and need to be at more rpm than the smarty which allows more fuel and earlier will let you pull the same hill with 1/4 throttle (same as 3/4 -100% stock) and at lower RPM.

Even thow it seems like it is doign it "easier" it may not be as you ar using more fuel to get to the same place.

However you as the driver can control this a light foot and watching your EGT's/boost are a easy way to squeeze more miles per gallon.

You will see it when you get your gauges. EGT = work The higher the EGT the more work your motor is doing.

Pull the same long steep hill with and w/o the software and see how much easily you can move the EGT with the Smarty. Not that the Stock SW won't make 1400 it will, but it;s harder and takes longer for the needle to move there.

So to get the potential better MPG the Smarty CAN and WILL give you you have to exercise peddle discipline.

Rod_Montana

Thanks, JohninNH. The first 35k miles taught me to keep the rpm's low to keep the mpg high. Better to power up the hill in sixth at 1400rpm than in 5th at 1800rpm. With stock SW that.

Your experience with Smarty shows that the opposite is true. Do it in 5th, at the higher rpm with less pedal. Sounds good to me. Some of the hills are speed limted because of the tight turn radius or off camber condition or whatever. In summer, you can hit them with a lot more speed, but right now, there's only so much oversteer you can apply when the front end heads for the outside of the turn.

These big trucks are a hoot to power uphill on snow and ice. Downhill, not.

JohnInNH

On the flat 1200-1400 works fine. ;-)

DaveB.inVa

After I put on SW1 I went from about 18~18.5 up to around 20 hand calculated.