How am I supposed to tow when I don't know ???

[jgos929]

When I had my Chevy 2500 gasser I could drive for 30 miles before my trans gauge needle would start to rise. Now with my 99 F350 DRW I'm at 180 3 miles from my house. It was 80* this morning when I left and it sat at 180 the entire time. What I find weird is that my truck has been sitting outside my office since 8:30 this morning it is now 2:22 and when I turn the key on to get power to the gauges it's showing its at 130*. Now granted its 100* outside but shouldn't it have cooled to atleast ambient by now after 6 hours of sitting. I know its hot outside but that doesn't make sense. I'm gonna be towing a 20' car hauler from TX to NM next week and I'm scared as hell the gauge is gonna go through the roof on me but it may not be the actual temp. I've read about guys with jumpy gauges and what not but mine doesn't do that its steady and then it holds.

[fishingjred73]

just because ambient is a 100. All that metal soaks up the heat. think of how hot your interior is after setting all day, hotter than ambient for sure.

[jgos929]

Yeah but your talking about a big space thats only seperated from the sun by the roof and a window. With the windows up I do believe it would get that hot for sure but not with them cracked and a visor covering the window. The trans pan is under the truck technically shaded and able to get any breeze available. I just find it weird that after that amount of time its still that hot. Guess I won't know till me and the trailer hit the road

[bucwheat]

Originally Posted by fishingjred73

just because ambient is a 100. All that metal soaks up the heat. think of how hot your interior is after setting all day, hotter than ambient for sure.

I may be wrong but 180 degrees is not that bad.

[toddy]

180 is normal. When its hot outised I can get to 180 in the 6 miles it takes me to get to work.I have had days where I havent driven my truck since the day before and I start it and my trans temp guage is reading 100-130. You should be fine. Unless your needle is rising past 80-90 degrees over outside ambient temp than you shouldn't have anything to worry about.

[RedDye01]

mine reads 170 to 190 with a deep pan on my way to work after about 8 miles on the fwy...about 95 degrees outside. I had a bronco with practically the same trans and going up a 7% grade at almost WOT (thats what it took to get up the hill) it would maybe hit 170 and sat at about 130 the rest of the time. I cant explain it but thats the way these trucks seem to be.

[Highbeam]

So is this an aftermarket gauge reading from the trans test port? The difference between the chevy and the ford is that the ford has a thermostat deal that doesn't send atf to the coolers until the trans hits 100 or so. This means that the trans in your ford will quickly climb to 100 and then it should slow down.

Do you have aftermarket transmission cooling? I do not believe that the OEM coolers should be used for towing anything significant. The 6.0 cooler or tru-cool max cooler seem to wokr great on our trucks.

Hitting 180 in 3 miles is not normal in my experience. Perhaps the low 100s if the conditions are right.

[new big toy]

in my early 99 im lucky if i hit 160 after 2 hours of driving at 70 mph with my 6 speed

[RedDye01]

its a manual......not exactly relevant to this topic. sorry.