Gas Mileage Effects

I kept track of my mileage on the way to and from Belgrade for my pickup. I have a double cab short bed 2012 Tacoma. I took my old Leer camper shell off for the drive up, and don’t numbers for when I had my old shell on. Anyway, with the shell off I was getting 17.92 mpg and on the way back with the GFC I was getting 15.86. These were averages on the freeway over about 700 miles. If someone with a dcsb 2nd gen Tacoma with a Leer shell, post your mileage so we can compare the shell mileage with the GFC.

not tacomoa -

f150 super crew (v6 ecoboost) - full 2mpg loss for me at highway speeds. weight plus lack of aerodynamics seems to be the killer here for me at least

It would be excellent if GFC would design a fairing for the leading edge.

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Agreed, I was definitely a bit bummed by the design of the current one. But I’m no aerodynamics expert, that’s for sure.

Agreed on both. Full 2 mpg loss on gas plus very loud @owennoll which trim level is your f150? I think xlt must just be straight metal with zero insulation in the roof

add a roof rack to help break the wind… i haven’t noticed a difference in my recent mountain trips. went from an RTT to the GFC…

I added mods incrementally.

A moderate 1” lift had almost no measurable impact on mpg.
Heavy 265/75r16 E tires took about 1-2 mpgs.
The gfc took another 1-2 mpgs. No noise from the gfc.

It depends on the conditions but combined the loss is 2-4 mpgs.

I would be interested in a fairing if offered.

It’s a Lariat. I thought the sound dampening in the interior was generally quite good until the camper. The buffeting I get is more of a deep vibration than “noise”

I lost 1mpg with the GFC compared to a below cab height RTT on my lifted and and baja style bumpered Tacoma over my 3000 mile trip home.

prinsu has a growing lineup of racks with a nice fairing to help kick some air up, https://prinsudesignstudio.com

they even have the habitat rack if you don’t want to cut yours down.

if you need additional kick up, you can get some sheet metal or alumninum and attach it to a crossbar with an angled up additional faring

i gained about 1mph with the gfc over my old set up, the lower profile and hard surface helped i guess. so from 12-13 to 13-14 total average city / hwy

IMG_0600

has anyone actually tested this to see what the MPG gain is? If it can help negate the 2 mpg drop, its totally worth it.

you can see how the prinsu at least fills that gap between the roof and the camper…

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I’ve tracked my fuel mileage for years. V6 DCSB Tacoma, heavily modified. I’ve averaged 12.602 mpg since adding the GFC 3939 miles ago. The preceding 4039 miles I averaged 12.764 mpg. To me that’s just the slop in daily driving so there was no appreciable difference with the setup of my truck.

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The prinsu habitat rack will fit with the GFC?

should work almost perfectly…

compare how far back past the front door it goes…

and where the camper sits on a 2nd gen dcsb

3rd gen dcsb
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even the access cabs could use that one… you’d still have to request the access cab hardware to modify the roof for a roof rack. https://tctmagazine.net/july-2015-volume-8-issue-3/prinsu-designs-accessrac

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or just trim down the full rack to fit like i did…

habitat already installed with one here actually… Roof Rack on Cab

small notching needed

It works, but there’s a very small amount of real estate on a short bed

Yeah I saw the guy with a 3rd gen had to trim his a bit. Doesn’t make sense for me to buy a new prinsu and cut it down if I can just cut mine.

I’m really just looking to use it to mount my maxtrax on after getting the GFC and keep running my adapt LB