First long camping trip with the Tundra- report

Howdy,
My lovely wife and I just returned home from our first 2-week trip. Our 2017 5.7 CM Tundra (38gal tank) towed our 2020 213rds Apex Nano.
We had minimal payload in the truck (my sticker says max is 1270), with just the two of us, two smaller dogs, sometimes some firewood and typical road snacks.
The truck has Bilstein 5100s, rear TRD Sway Bar. We run with an E2 WDH with Sway control and our camper, fully loaded weighs in at about 5500lbs, with about 650lbs of tongue weight.

We trekked 2475 miles- Tampa, FL --> Delta, AL --> Bristol, TN (some driving through VA and KY on this leg) --> Beaver, WV --> Pickens, SC --> Savannah, GA --> Tampa, FL

This was my first time towing anywhere other than flat FL, and I was admittedly a bit nervous about the mountains, but the Tundra did a fantastic job! We ran a good amount of S4 and a little S3 through the elevations, particularly in AL and TN. Figuring out the gears took just a little getting used to, but once I got the hang of it, everything worked out just fine.

We averaged 9.2mpg for the trip- about 2050 of it was towing. I was very pleased with this, as we had budgeted for about 8mpg.

Love this truck, love the road.

 

Thats good mpg especially if you were climbing some big hills.

 

Thanks for the trip report! Looks like you two had a great trip and the Tundra handled its business nicely. Glad to hear it.

 

Glad you didn't kill any kittens, lol

Good for you, glad you had a good time.

 

Nice report! Just got a camper last month and went on little cruise to Hershey park, about 50 miles from me, had some hills but the tundra handled it without skipping a beat. I agree with you, love this truck. Pulling about 7600 lbs with a tongue close to 800. Most of this is highway miles.

 

I see your trans temps, what was your engine temps?

 

What gear selection did you use? Tow/Haul and Drive or Tow/Haul and some variation of S mode?

 

Great question, I don’t see value in the RPM gauge and want to replace it with engine temp gauge, but I can’t find it as a listing.

 

I was running it in standard gear setup, didn’t use the tow/haul button. Tried it when I pulled out on the highway but put it back to normal driving after I was up to speed.

 

That's close to the same setup weight-wise as I will soon be running, so it's nice to hear you had a pleasant trip!

 

Very decent MPG !

Definitely should be looking into a trans cooler for your Tundra.

I was running the same temps as you before I did the cooler install on my 2019 CM. Now my pan temps stay right around 200 degrees when towing my 6500lb camper .

 

Regross, what app is that and how is linked to the truck?
TIA

 

It’s the OBD fusion app and I Bluetooth it’s connection to the Veepeak OBDcheck as seen in the attached pic. It’s pretty cool to use and lately I recently saw a decrease in the trans temp by running the truck in tow/haul mode all the time while pulling the RV.

 

Nice report and even better trip. Not it’s time to start planning the next trip.

 

Seriously considering it. Did you install it or did you get Toyota to do your install? I’m first to admit, I’m mechanically challenged and thinking of spending the extra cash just to keep it in warranty.

 

Im a mechanic so I installed the cooler myself , its not very difficult . Many other non mechanically inclined people have done successful installs . Lots of info on this forum about it .

 

Thanks for the info Rgross.
I have a puck I used on my van with the Torque Lite app.
I'll check that one out.The one I have and app doesn't do trans temp.

 

I had to program the app according to one of our tundra brothers here on this forum. I just followed these instructions and it was able to then give me my torque info. Worked without a problem and maybe it’s something you could program into your app.