I probably should clear up that I'm not bashing buying a more efficient vehicle, generally older stuff does need more work/repairs, and if someone drove a lot more miles it probably makes a ton of sense to buy something newer.
Here's a fun photo of my dad's truck, that was a 1989 Mazda 2.6L manual 4x4 and on a good day it would get 20mpg with my dad driving it (not quite an ecomodder level driver for mpg, but not as bad as the average driver). The same racks went on my dad's T100 when I convinced him to upgrade trucks, same or better mpg, more power, bigger truck.
He burns about 20 facecord per year, I burn around 12-15. Generally we are getting ash wood, so 1 full cord (3 face cord) weighs about 2880 lb dry or 4184 lb wet according to google. The T100 hauls around 2 face cord in the box with racks and about 5 on my dad's trailer if we completely max out the load, we are looking at about 10 tons in just wood. That's clearly beyond the designed capacity of the T100 and we drive effectively empty roads slowly if/when we get that big of a load. The Ford would handle the load much better and probably get better mpg while hauling due to the nature of diesels.
Here's my car, the areo on it I think isn't super bad for the overall shape. The rear window clearly slops too fast, I can see the line where snow and such doesn't blow off (attached air flow), it's a small almost triangle shape at the top of the window. It has a factory belly pan for the engine, I think the rear doesn't have one though. Wheels aren't half bad for areo, nearly flat with some styling along the edge. It's just the size, weight, and the fact it's a v8 that kills the mpg. If it was a stick I'd think I could hit 30mpg pretty easily with it, it holds gears way too long and doesn't hold gears as well as my corolla for loading the engine.
https://i.gyazo.com/46fef220a5391d8f...d9c02c1454.jpg
Here's a snow storm to give an idea of Michigan weather, this clearly is a more worst case type of storm, but it seems we get a storm atleast once a year that dumps 4-12in on us for 1-2 days. All of the video shows around the city, the country is plowed much less often, sometimes a week or longer after the snow comes down, like my road is a dead end dirt road. Also should mention, I can tell those guys aren't used to snow, they got stuck so easily, but I grew up in this stuff so I guess I have the experence. I've drove my corolla to work before dragging bottom all the way (for over an hour drive). When I got home I had a HUGE ball of ice built up from the engine heat melting the snow and refreezing to ice. The car had about 1in of suspension before the ice hit. Decided after that that if I'm dragging bottom, I'm not going for the trip unless completely required. Having a truck has been nice, I generally drive a car in snow if it's not too deep.
I should mention, I don't watch TV, news, and very very rarely on social media. I don't buy a 4x4 just because of the snow, it's just an added benefit of having one available. If the truck gets 25mpg with the mods and such, the cost of driving the current car is pretty pointless because I can drop the insurance and not drive it and only drive the truck and get a better savings. Clearly a better mpg car is a different story, just thinking short term on that.
@freebeard
Yea, pretty shocked how many replies in such a short amount of time. I guess it's a different topic than normal so maybe that's why it peaks more interest... like who in their right mind tries to get better mpg out of a big heavy diesel truck xD.
The bug deflector is a solid delete, never really liked them, but for some reason they are quite common. My dad's truck came with one too, I'm thinking the 2001 truck also has one, maybe it was a factory thing.
The hybrid setup is quite interesting, I just read the start of the thread, but looks like someone already did what I was thinking since an alternator can also be used as a motor, sounds like a larger motor was used in the thread though. I suspect the belt drive would be the limiting factor but I'm sure the thread goes into more details about attachment and such.
I also check my email often, so being the OP, I try to reply somewhat quickly.
@cRiPpLe_rOoStEr
I remember your user from way back when I was active on here. I'll have to look a bit more into the water injection systems. I saw some place (don't recall where) that it gave around 5% gains, does that seem about right? I think that was in context for a gas engine.
CNG is pretty interesting, I suspect the tanks are at pretty high pressures, propane runs around 100psi to get to liquid form. I'd think the propane systems would be a bit more established.
For water injection on a diesel, I suspect the concept is similar to a gas engine, cool the combustion chamber? It's been a long time since I read about those systems, and I always was looking at it from a gas engine point of view. Diesels seem to be so much more robust to mods, it seems to make sense to try things as long as I don't go to the extremes.
The video I watched about propane was talking about it with the priority of being more power, but the side benefit of good mpg too. He claimed with a fuel system mod, 4in exhaust (and gauges to monitor exhaust temps, boost etc), reflash style tuner set to +90hp setting, and propane, the engine put out about 600ft-lbs of torque at the wheels and the typical mileage was reported around 21mpg. I haven't looked into the fuel system mod, he only mentioned it in the video, but the guy specializes in powerstrokes and everything technical he talked about lines up with what I understand about diesels and my dad also agreed with what he was saying (ASE Cert mechanic). I don't need the extra power, but that should translate into getting even better mpg than the typical person that's beating on the truck using that 600ft-lbs on take off.
Anyway, CNG vs Propane (LP), I'm not sure if there's a place around me that refills CNG tanks. I can get tanks filled at a local gas station for LP, or if I get a nursing valve in a bulk tank, I could refill my own tanks and pay bulk price. To give a real world number, to refil a 20lb tank like a grill uses, it would cost me roughly $6.08, while the store near me that does tank exchange charges $20 (maybe it was $25, been a while since I used that service). I'm not sure what the gas station would charge, they use a scale to weigh how much LP you get and charge by the pound.
I keep making huge replies lol. It's a byproduct my tech background, I can type somewhere around 70-100wpm.
Anyway, thanks for all the ideas so far, I have so many directions to look into. It's always great having several options. If I can get my truck to hit into the 30mpg range while still having the capacity of using it as a truck (on and off road), I'm sure I could get my dad into cloning what I do to my truck and stop driving his Camry that gets around 30mpg and his T100 that gets around 17mpg (his rear axle pinion bearing is bad, it vibrates at lower speeds 5th gear, he doesn't drive over 70mph generally to hit 5th gear). I worked a deal out with him for a 3rd member to put in his truck, he just hasn't done the work yet.
... ok I'm getting side tracked again, better hit post before I get on 20 other topics lol.