Death Valley Trek, some issues.........

Round trip from NJ 7,583mi in 18 days with 11.8mpg average. I weighed the truck at a truck stop and total weight was over 8,000 loaded. For the extra weight I added stage 1 91 octane Whipple Tune, +3 Deavers, and E load/S speed rated KO2s

Trip was awesome, Raptor suspension handled the washboard roads like a champ, I was easily driving at 60mph on the dirt roads. Rock crawling was no problem; I could not believe how much abuse the tires took, so many sharp pointy rocks, it is difficult to avoid them. On the highway I didn’t even feel the extra weight or wind resistance. Note: I drove it hard, cruising at 84mph, passing at WOT and using manual up/dawn shifts while offroading, my rpms were constantly 3-6000rpms while offroad and up/down hills.

OK, here are the issues; I hope this helps someone with the planning on their trip:

Death Valley requires lots of driving, and you have to fill up every chance you get. There are 3 gas stations in the area and one only has 87 octane the other claim 91 octane. I skipped the 87 octane and drove to the next just in time with 2 miles left. I filled with 91 octane, 5 min later my dash lit up with all warnings and initiated limp mode. I didn’t know what it was because my scanner just showed powertrain fault codes, I thought I was having tranny issues again. I cleared the codes, disconnected the battery to reset ECU and started to only drive in AWD. Everything was fine, codes returned only when I restarted truck so I spent the rest of my trip only turning off truck when sleeping and resetting ECU every morning. After I left Death Valley and I filled up in Vegas with Shell 91 octane the problem went away, that’s when I realized it was bad low octane gas. I stopped at a Ford dealer and had them read the stored codes and he said I had bunch of misfires. I didn’t notice the misfires because I was driving on dirt rds. So now I have to come up with a fix to the quality gas requirement for my tune, if I have this problem with a 91 octane tune I feel for those with a 93 octane tune. Truthfully, I didn’t find any gas higher than 91 octane until I returned to the northeast. I’m going to bring octane booster additive next time and hope that works.

Other than that all was great, Death Valley, especially the Saline is made for the Raptor. I’ll send some of my favorite rds.

What codes were you throwing

My wife thinks I only have 3 guns

I pulled these on my Android OBD Check Torque App…..Dealer also said he saw misfire codes but I didn’t get the number.

P04DB – Powertrain / P02FF – Powertrain / P0027 – Powertrain / P0303 – Powertrain

I also pulled a few network codes but I don’t think it was related, probably just due to no signal in the Valley. U1B00 / U3F04 / U3F05

At least your truck was driveable.

Wifey put some sh*t fuel in her Macan S last year. It died within 2 miles of the fuel station.
Had to have the entire tank, all the fuel lines and 2 fuel filters replaced via dealer.
Macan had 3500 miles on it. Brand new...
Allstate took care of everything...but we were livid .

Nice pics by the way..

Great info, cool pics. Thanks for sharing!

When I was in Death Valley I filled up at the gas station by the resort. Cost more, but it worked. In the west, 91 is about the best you can get.

this was one of the reason i went with a cobb accessport, the ability to run different octane tunes at a moments notice. do you not have the ability to put the truck back to an 87 tune or back to a factory tune?

That is probably the reason I keep it stock. Not saying you wont have an issue, you sure can, but stock tune is much more compliant with crap fuels you can get on the road.

Sam

Good info. Looks like a fun trip. How long did you stay?

With Whipple going back and forth from tune to stock is not an option. I spent four days in the area, Unfortunately, I had to be careful not to get myself in a location that I will not be able to recover the truck. Every morning we prayed the codes would clear and the truck will start, so we were happy to finally get back on black top. Kind of put a damper on the trip, also I didn't go off road at other National Parks we visited on the way home. The truck runs great now with 93 octane but I have to figure out a fix for my Canada/Alaska trek I am planning next year. I really like the tune but it may be a problem to have it. I'll contact Whipple and see if they have a way to tune for lower octane.