nikhsub1
FRF Addict
So I have a 2018 with just under 30k miles on it. Mostly used for urban assault duty in Los Angeles. Off roaded sparingly for no other reason than time... Pretty modified - Goosetune, FMIC, turbo intakes, downpipes, full cat back, throttle body, S&B intake. Alcon front brakes, Fox 3.0, Icon UCA, Deaver rear springs.
The point of me listing this is for context, not bragging rights. There are more mods but don't really matter to the story here. This is the first real family road trip in the Raptor - Los Angeles to Aspen (with stops in between).
Let me start by saying I love the truck. It is the perfect vehicle in Los Angeles IMO. The roads here suck. You can do things in it that just aren't possible in other forms of transport. You can drive downtown without a care in the world. Pot holes and dips just do not matter the way they do if you drive a porsche or any sports car. Heck, any car for that matter. This may be a rambling post as I've had some quantity of tequila after arriving home and unpacking. In short, the Gen 2 Raptor is the PERFECT road trip vehicle.
We made our way out of LA at 11AM on a Thursday. Had the Yeti cooler behind the passenger seat. Provisions are essential as you know.
We had a full load for the most part - bed filled with clothes, food and other necessities. 3 bikes on top via Yakima jet stream bars slotted into my Retrax XR.
Some roadside art along the way somewhere in NV.
First stop, Page, AZ for some Lake Powell shenanigans.
After kayaking some canyon hiking
A double rainbow somewhere along the way...
Horse Shoe Bend which was incredible.
Quick lunch stop on our way to Moab
Some shots of Aspen
St. George
Obligatory stop at Cracker Barrel
Now that I've bored ya'll to tears with vacay pics, I'll get into the meat of my post. On the drive back to LA I hauled *** way more than the way out - I would do 95ish when I could, traffic permitting. Truck has no issue cruising at that speed or even faster, so long as your tire speed rating is there. Mine are rated to 112 I think. Did I mention it was hot as ****? In parts of the drive I saw 110 or so. I do have an FMIC and a 170 degree thermostat, which I think is KEY in hot weather. If you look at the coolant temp gauge, it never moves, it's just an idiot gauge. You really need to forescan that ***** and put the actual temp above the gauge. The absolute highest temp I saw was 214 - of course this was at high load, going up hill.
One thing to note since I did use cruise control a bit on this drive. The truck will do EVERYTHING in it's power not to downshift from 10th, even when going up a grade. It will max out the boost hard before downshifting. I DO NOT LIKE THIS ONE BIT. Lugging the motor like that is a sure way to bring on detonation. So what I would do is when coming to a grade, while watching the boost gauge, I'd hit the minus paddle on the steering wheel to manually have the truck drop to 9th gear. If the grade got steeper, I'd hit it again for 8th gear and then 7th if necessary. I'd much rather have the revs up than the boost pegged at 2k RPM. The truck gives no ***** about doing 85 in 7th either. The nice thing is that once you manually shift down, even in cruise control, the truck will never shift into a higher gear than what is shown on the dash. So if you are in 10th and flick the minus paddle, 10th will disappear from the display and the truck will never go back into 10th until you flick the plus paddle again. I quite like this feature, and 10th gear is generally not needed at all IMO unless you are driving on total flat ground.
A note on the ****** drivers in this country - they get worse as you get closer to California. Idiots have not ******* clue that the left lane IS FOR PASSING ONLY. You get a-holes in the left lane that just cruise there thinking they own the road and you have to illegally go around them on the right hand side. They figure if they are going the speed limit, no one should need to pass? Not sure what these morons are thinking but they are a hazard. At one point I came up on a brand new white TRX. Got right behind him going about 70 ish in the left lane. As soon as the right lane opened up, I took off on my merry way. Those things are huge. And heavy. I have to say, even loaded up my truck hauls the mail.
I know there are folks that have over heated with light bars in the grill and FMICs. I really think that these trucks need a 170 thermostat if you are doing driving in hot climates. Also, I've done lots of thermal testing with heat exchangers and fans in computing environments but the concepts are the same. Light bars will disrupt airflow in a very bad way. They will deflect the air in such a way that it can starve the radiator of airflow. Having STACKED radiators is actually not a big deal in reality - my testing proved it. Those that think the FMIC in front of the radiator being detrimental are incorrect. There are many OEMs that stack heat exchangers without issue.
Anyway, these are my thoughts and ramblings after a 2500 mile road trip in the Raptor.
*All photos taken with an iPhone 12 Max Pro and unedited.
The point of me listing this is for context, not bragging rights. There are more mods but don't really matter to the story here. This is the first real family road trip in the Raptor - Los Angeles to Aspen (with stops in between).
Let me start by saying I love the truck. It is the perfect vehicle in Los Angeles IMO. The roads here suck. You can do things in it that just aren't possible in other forms of transport. You can drive downtown without a care in the world. Pot holes and dips just do not matter the way they do if you drive a porsche or any sports car. Heck, any car for that matter. This may be a rambling post as I've had some quantity of tequila after arriving home and unpacking. In short, the Gen 2 Raptor is the PERFECT road trip vehicle.
We made our way out of LA at 11AM on a Thursday. Had the Yeti cooler behind the passenger seat. Provisions are essential as you know.
We had a full load for the most part - bed filled with clothes, food and other necessities. 3 bikes on top via Yakima jet stream bars slotted into my Retrax XR.
Some roadside art along the way somewhere in NV.
First stop, Page, AZ for some Lake Powell shenanigans.
After kayaking some canyon hiking
A double rainbow somewhere along the way...
Horse Shoe Bend which was incredible.
Quick lunch stop on our way to Moab
Some shots of Aspen
St. George
Obligatory stop at Cracker Barrel
Now that I've bored ya'll to tears with vacay pics, I'll get into the meat of my post. On the drive back to LA I hauled *** way more than the way out - I would do 95ish when I could, traffic permitting. Truck has no issue cruising at that speed or even faster, so long as your tire speed rating is there. Mine are rated to 112 I think. Did I mention it was hot as ****? In parts of the drive I saw 110 or so. I do have an FMIC and a 170 degree thermostat, which I think is KEY in hot weather. If you look at the coolant temp gauge, it never moves, it's just an idiot gauge. You really need to forescan that ***** and put the actual temp above the gauge. The absolute highest temp I saw was 214 - of course this was at high load, going up hill.
One thing to note since I did use cruise control a bit on this drive. The truck will do EVERYTHING in it's power not to downshift from 10th, even when going up a grade. It will max out the boost hard before downshifting. I DO NOT LIKE THIS ONE BIT. Lugging the motor like that is a sure way to bring on detonation. So what I would do is when coming to a grade, while watching the boost gauge, I'd hit the minus paddle on the steering wheel to manually have the truck drop to 9th gear. If the grade got steeper, I'd hit it again for 8th gear and then 7th if necessary. I'd much rather have the revs up than the boost pegged at 2k RPM. The truck gives no ***** about doing 85 in 7th either. The nice thing is that once you manually shift down, even in cruise control, the truck will never shift into a higher gear than what is shown on the dash. So if you are in 10th and flick the minus paddle, 10th will disappear from the display and the truck will never go back into 10th until you flick the plus paddle again. I quite like this feature, and 10th gear is generally not needed at all IMO unless you are driving on total flat ground.
A note on the ****** drivers in this country - they get worse as you get closer to California. Idiots have not ******* clue that the left lane IS FOR PASSING ONLY. You get a-holes in the left lane that just cruise there thinking they own the road and you have to illegally go around them on the right hand side. They figure if they are going the speed limit, no one should need to pass? Not sure what these morons are thinking but they are a hazard. At one point I came up on a brand new white TRX. Got right behind him going about 70 ish in the left lane. As soon as the right lane opened up, I took off on my merry way. Those things are huge. And heavy. I have to say, even loaded up my truck hauls the mail.
I know there are folks that have over heated with light bars in the grill and FMICs. I really think that these trucks need a 170 thermostat if you are doing driving in hot climates. Also, I've done lots of thermal testing with heat exchangers and fans in computing environments but the concepts are the same. Light bars will disrupt airflow in a very bad way. They will deflect the air in such a way that it can starve the radiator of airflow. Having STACKED radiators is actually not a big deal in reality - my testing proved it. Those that think the FMIC in front of the radiator being detrimental are incorrect. There are many OEMs that stack heat exchangers without issue.
Anyway, these are my thoughts and ramblings after a 2500 mile road trip in the Raptor.
*All photos taken with an iPhone 12 Max Pro and unedited.
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