All right, before everyone jumps on the wagon and me to death, I have to ask. I searched through piles of threads and can't get a conclusive answer. I really did!

Has anyone done any heavy towing with the smarty yet? It might still be too soon to tell how it does, but I'm wondering if maybe I should go that route. I've ordered a V5, but it hasn't been shipped yet, and I'm getting tired of waiting for it. Something about connections not working on all trucks or something. Anyway, how does the smarty do, can you set it for good towing power, similar to the V5, without blasting the tranny? The upside would be you could unhook the trailer and turn up the power.

 

The smarty fuels real hard on the low end, witch will help get you moving when you heavy, but can also be hard on the stock trans

 

I'm going to tow my 10k+ gooseneck this weekend. It will be the first time since I have the Smarty. I'll set it on one of the softer settings. I think it will be great for getting the trailer moving, just curious how the egt's will do with the stock hx-35 turbo. I'll try and reply after the weekend on how it does. In my mind it should be great for towing, but I'll let you know.

 

The "get up and go" that everyone is raving about should be awesome for towing, providing tranny's and clutches can hold up. This is exactly what I feel I'm lacking with my tow rig, that initial grunt. Having to climb a grade without a run at it, the smarty may be great. Let us know Tiger Rag. Of course heat will be the enemy as well.

 

Yeah the tranny is mainly what I'm worried about. I figured with 9 or 10 settings, there must be one for towing, maybe not. Good luck this weekend, let us know how you make out.

 

Thats my concern too, I don't know how much life is left in my clutch.

There is only one setting SW#1 that they expressly say not to tow heavy with because the timing is very aggressive.

I think the rest are towable. I towed a combined load of19,000 lbs on saturday using SW#9 on my otherwise stock 2000 6 speed. Made a huge difference getting the load moving and keeping it moving on the back roads. Never went over 900*F and I never went over 45 mph because of the roads.

With a bigger set of injectors you would probably want to put it on a tamer program like #5 or #7.

 

Is this because of EGT's or what? Is running SW #1 harder on the engine even when unloaded too then?

 

Lots of timing and heavy loads can make for some high cylinder pressures...they're running high timing to get good economy!

This has the potential to be hard on head gaskets with big injectors, and lots of turbo I wouldn't lose sleep over it if you're close to stock, and tow less than 6-7K lbs!

Besides, why would you want to tow in Economy mode?? I know I wouldn't
Chris

 

Well I keep going back and forth. I might get the 275 injectors, but worry that combined with a va or smarty will smoke my tranny. I might get just the va or smarty with stock injectors. VA is not in a hurry to get here, evidently. If I just go with one box/module, reckon it should be smarty or va? Truck is mostly stock, but pulling 10,000 lbs of trailer and load daily. Too many decisions !

 

I don't pull in Economy mode because, well the trailer weighs 5,000 empty and then add what ever I'm hauling. That and I want all the low end fuel #9 gives it.

I thought the economy setting would be a slug, I was very surprised the first time I tried it. It's much better than stock, both response and powerwise. The engine definately has a slightly different tone to it. It'll move right along when you want it too.

Timberman, what ever box you decide to go with, you can always do injectors later. I'm going to do injectors, but I only want to do it once. As a result I don't know how far I'm going to go yet, but its one of my tow rigs so its not going to be too crazy.
BTW, I was thinking about getting a comp before I heard about the Catcher/Mad ECM's. They really appealed to me, I was going to get one, but something even better came out and well, I bought a Smarty instead.

 

Light trailer...mine weighs 7500 empty, plus whatever I'm hauling Nobody ever said I was smart, but I can sure get there Quick, Fast, and in a hurry

Chris

 

How big is your 7500lb. trailer? My 5000lb. is a 20 footer, 16 straight, 4 beaver tail, 102" wide, deck between the wheels, 1/4" diamond plate fenders to drive over, 9000lb. winch, hydralic landing gear. Check my pics. We have a 31 ft. trailer that weights 6000 without the winch. Not 7500lbs., but both are overbuilt.

 

How was your milage in the economy settings, or any setting for that matter?

 

I had been getting 16 to 16.5 mpg stock in mixed driving 50/50 highway/stop and go w/ stop lights.

on SW#9 I got 16.5 mpg, didn't get better, didn't get worse.
on SW#1 economy setting I got 17.5 mpg, I imagine it will get better as I calm down a bit on the jack rabbits starts.

 

That's pretty much exactly where my mileage was on my first tank with SW#9. Also unchanged from before, although I had a Quadzilla box on mine that I removed. Also, my truck is a late 2002 without CAD on the front.