Joe Willey
Member
Returned home from the road trip on Sunday, May 28th. We drove a total of 10,866 miles, burned 910.7 gallons of gas at a cost of $2,538.26, and averaged 11.93 MPG. The MPG calculation covers all miles driven (with and without trailer). The cheapest we paid for a gallon of gas was $2.43 in Sonora, TX and the most $3.34 in Lake Tahoe, NV. Fuel prices began to spike upwards on Easter Day, April 16th and remained at over $3.00 per gallon until May 8th, when they began to “normalizeâ€.
We only had trouble making one grade. It was a 31% grade that stopped us cold. I do think if we had been able to get a running start that we might have been able to make it. It was on a mountaintop West of Watsonville, CA, a place an old Army buddy of mine calls home. Fortunately, this was one of the few stops going up the mountain with cell coverage and that there was a turn-out across the road from where the ST stopped for us to back into. My buddy’s wife rescued us with her Lincoln Navigator. The Navigator hauled the trailer the rest of the way up the mountain like it was a feather! We left the trailer hooked up to the Navigator and let him tow it down his mountain when we left.
We had absolutely no problems towing into Tahoe. However, we talked with another ST owner who was towing a trailer as big as ours who told us he thought he was going to burn his tyranny out climbing the grades into Tahoe. We were also able to handle the grades in Yellowstone as well as the Deadwood area. My wife and I both credit the ease we had negotiating the grades to the modifications we made to our ST. With the exception of the 31% grade we handled all other grades at about 55 MPH and between 3,000 and 4,000 RPM.
From Florida to San Diego we drove between 70 and 75 MPH and averaged 9.3 MPG. When we left San Diego we dropped our cruising speed down to 65 MPH. This produced well over an extra mile to the gallon (10.7 MPG).
Conclusion: The ST 6 cylinder can tow a 24-foot trailer cross-country. Will I do it again? Yes, but next time the ST will be the vehicle towed.
We only had trouble making one grade. It was a 31% grade that stopped us cold. I do think if we had been able to get a running start that we might have been able to make it. It was on a mountaintop West of Watsonville, CA, a place an old Army buddy of mine calls home. Fortunately, this was one of the few stops going up the mountain with cell coverage and that there was a turn-out across the road from where the ST stopped for us to back into. My buddy’s wife rescued us with her Lincoln Navigator. The Navigator hauled the trailer the rest of the way up the mountain like it was a feather! We left the trailer hooked up to the Navigator and let him tow it down his mountain when we left.
We had absolutely no problems towing into Tahoe. However, we talked with another ST owner who was towing a trailer as big as ours who told us he thought he was going to burn his tyranny out climbing the grades into Tahoe. We were also able to handle the grades in Yellowstone as well as the Deadwood area. My wife and I both credit the ease we had negotiating the grades to the modifications we made to our ST. With the exception of the 31% grade we handled all other grades at about 55 MPH and between 3,000 and 4,000 RPM.
From Florida to San Diego we drove between 70 and 75 MPH and averaged 9.3 MPG. When we left San Diego we dropped our cruising speed down to 65 MPH. This produced well over an extra mile to the gallon (10.7 MPG).
Conclusion: The ST 6 cylinder can tow a 24-foot trailer cross-country. Will I do it again? Yes, but next time the ST will be the vehicle towed.
