99 24 vavle stock, 152,000 km auto transmission
pull 28 foot 5th wheel, double slide.

rather then a chip, wht modes can i do to this truck to get a little more jam. ive bieng noticing a change wheni pull. 8 out of 10 times ive pulled my camper its like its not hooked up to my truck... the other 2 times it seems like i am hooked up to 2 campers...


any ideas whats up with it..
thsnks

 

In my experiance that sounds like wind. Even a small cross wind is a horsepower robbing pain. I would rather hit a strong direct headwind than a cross wind. Unfortantly here in Iowa there is no shortage of wind so I REALY notice and apreciate it when the wind dont blow.

 

I have got 9 miles per gallon driving and changed direction and went up to over 16 towing in Nevada, the wind does blow there, funny feeling,allmost full pedal one way and hardly any the other,

 

wind may be a factor,
just seems like when I hit 4 gear the truck legs a bit...almost struggling...
I don't want to chip it. want to to after market exhaust and intake in it.


just figured it would pull like a champ even on a shitty day it would just pull threw it... camper weighs 7000 lbs and 1150lbs hitch weight.


i pulled this with a 98 6.5 diesel and it didn't have enough either.. was just thinking going from that to my dodge imagined it would pull right threw anything.




or is my expectation to high ?
any insight ?


Thanks

 

yes... sounds like expectations too high.

the intake and exhaust is not going to fix your issues.

A "chip" (programmer) is the quickest/easiest way to gain HP... but can your tranny handle that? Turbo? and ect.? Programmers have a way of snowballing expenses to upgrade everything else to handle the newfound power.

I agree with the others, it's the wind. The weight alone is not that big of a deal.

Have your tranny checked out too.

 

Towing that much weight you definitely need to look at the transmission before doing anything else. Do you know what your peak tranny fluid temps are when towing?

 

My first Dodge was exactly the same as yours. 98.5 auto. Pulled great below 55 or above 70 but that area inbetween it was a dog. The gap between 3rd and 4th is way to big. You have to get it wound up in 4th putting you at or over 70 before it comes back to life. Or downshift and slow down. If you trully wana pull better and dont want to up the power change the auto out for a 5 or preferably 6 speed. I had a 04.5 after the 98.5 and I MADE darn sure I got a 6 speed that time. I wish I would have held out when buying this truck cause the 06 I have now has exactly the same gap from 3rd to 4th your 99 has it just has enough more power from the factory to overcome the absolutly crappy tranies problems. My 04 and this 06 have exactly the same engine and rear end gears but the 04 with the 6 speed was a freight train when pulling compared to this auto.

 

Nope, a chip or programmer is pretty much the only way to gain any appreciable power by simple means. Yes a NV5600 swap would make your gear splits better, but thats a huge project and costly and only a small gain in power to the rear wheels, just becasue it may be slightly more efficient than an older auto trans.
If you treat your trans well, it will handle a little extra juice. Trans temp guage and make sure the TC is locked when givin it the beans. Maybe a TC lock switch, not sure how the 47RE does TC lock up.
2nd hand programmers are dime a dozen and cheap. I'd spend the $2-300 for a used Edge or something and just use it wisely if you want more power.

 

i put tranny gauge in... needle didn't even move