Posted: Jun 05 2008 at 7:05am | IP Logged

Well, I just finished a 2000 mile driving trip from southeastern PA to a point 400 miles north of Montreal, Quebec.  This was for a hunting trip for black bear.  In the truck was about 500 poiunds of gear, food, water, etc and me as the driver.  I inflated my tires (Long Trails) to 38 psi before leaving and ran hi-test for the whole trip.  My average mileage was just a small fraction shy of 22.8 mpg with two legs of interstate driving averaging 25.5 mpg.  The overall average was taken down by a 200 mile stretch in Quebec province on an extremely hilly road driven in pouring rain with high winds.  That leg gave me 19.8 mpg. This mileage was repeated on 200 miles of dirt and gravel roads leading to the bear camp (100 miles each way).  I only used 4WD twice on a 100 yd length of road about a mile from my final destination where water from a beaver dam had flooded the road.

The truck ran flawlessly and burned no oil on the trip (I use Mobil 1 5W-30).  Usin hi-test, I handled steep hills with speed and power and no pinging.  So I was very pleased with the overall performance of the truck.  And yes, I got a nice black bear, ate lots of bear meat and am having a head and shoulder mount done.

Posted: Jun 09 2008 at 6:33pm | IP Logged

 No bears, but next week I'm leaving for South Dakota for a prairie dog shoot. Can't eat 'em, but I wouldn't want to, anyway We're taking a third guy along, to help with gas money, so we won't take my King Cab Frontier, but one of the other guy's Crew Cab Tundra. It actually works out a little better three ways in the bigger truck, than two ways in mine......

Posted: Jun 09 2008 at 10:35pm | IP Logged

Answer me this:

Does the Black Bear give a damm what kind of gas milage you got?

 (Just Kidd'ing) 

Posted: Jun 10 2008 at 6:26am | IP Logged

No, I don't think he does since he remained behind in Canada with the taxidermist!

I was VERY pleased with the way the truck ran and handled on that long trip.  One thing I did not mention is that the Nissan skid plates that I installed myself after purchasing the vehicle did what i bought them for.  They kept rocks and sticks from hitting the gas tank and engine oil pan.  I can see small dings in them from the couple of hundred miles of driving on the gravel roads at speed.  They may not work for rock crawling but are great at this kind of protection without adding a lot of weight.