Cooling A Hot Head: RIDE REPORT

By Scott Butera

My first long haul was just completed in June; 1000 miles round trip from Sacramento up I-5 to Coos Bay Oregon via the Medford/Grants Pass grade. Very happy with the V2 even though I still did have some momentary clutch fan engagement and at the strangest times too. The clutch fan partially engaged usually on the descent after a climb even though V2 fan was manually engaged whenever I was climbing with outside temps in the high 80’s. I found the clutch fan never engaged if I allowed the Allison to shift when it wanted to not when I forced it to, but then… I like to go fast up hill. This trip I average 60-65mph on 6% grade rather than 50mph w/o V2. Most notable was that the temp gauge, I know that stock temp gauges are notoriously all over the place for accuracy, but it never (EVER) hit the 210* mark on the gauge hanging, rather it hovered a click or two below 210*. In years past she was running cool if it stayed at 220*
I am very pleased with the performance increase; I was able to walk away from my buddies LB7 up the same grades where in years past he was out of sight halfway up the grade.

 Now!

Ride report, same destination, 2 years apart:

2010
Distance – 1012 miles
Tow Weight – 14,128 lbs.
Fuel – 83 gal @ 3.15gal = $261.45
MPG – 12.2

2008
Distance – 1024
Tow Weight – 14,075 lbs
Fuel – 108 gal @ $4.45gal = $480.60
MPG – 9.48

So fuel savings aside, the V2 was well worth the money in stress-free driving and overall drive comfort and I could hear the radio at moderate volume at all times. The RAD V2 kit with Fan was well worth the investment and I would do it again in a heartbeat.

This is a follow up to this story https://www.toyhauleradventures.com/2010/05/cooling-a-hot-head-chevy/