Horse Power

You want to look at the torque rating more than the horsepower. You could have 700 HP and 1250 ft lbs torque and crawl up a mountain, but 450 HP and 1850 torque and pass most trucks on the same hill.

 

Mine was 475 hp at factory set. The prev owner tuned to 500 hp. Runs strong, pulls on mountains very well. Stays on gear on hills and mountains.

 

I've owned everything from a 12v92 big horse, to a lil bitty 238. Guess what, they all got the job done.

 

you need to pick a truck that is setup for the type of terrain that you are going to run. What I mean is if you're running mountains you should have a gear ratio like 3.55 or 370 if you're running more of a flat area you want something like ia 342 or less bigger horsepower generally bigger to work however don't let anybody forget bigger horsepower motors generally burn more fuel.

 

This truck is in use for frac sand hauling in north PA. 3.70 is perfect for frac sand hauling in PA mountains. I used to have 2000 Freightliner Century. It had 3.42 and detroit 12.7/ 10 sp manuel overdrive on it and it was speedy in flat lands of oh, in, and il.

 

Absolutely wrong and this myth needs to die. You couldn't possibly be more wrong. First, those ratings are peak. Not everyone drives at peak horsepower or torque. Second torque is just a one dimensional rating, it means NOTHING without rpm. Add in RPM and what do you get? Horsepower!

I can apply 1500 ft lbs of torque with my body on a driveshaft using a super long extension, maybe I should push up those 80,000 lb loads up some hills?

As for the original topic, you need to consider a lot of things. First what is your max speed, and what kind of down low gearing do you need? Are you offroading? There's so many questions that need to be answered and you've given us very very little information.

If you're that heavy hauling in those areas you should at least have a 13 speed transmission, possibly an 18 speed. This is more important than horsepower or torque.

 

Mine has 3.70, it's not absolutely 500 HP. If you want to know how hp and lb/ft you are applying, take it the dyno test.

 

Nope, you are absloutely wrong. Have you ever driven a low torque truck with higher HP? I have owned a few, drove in the "good ole days" when you could have 500 HP and 1350 ft lb torque, and crawl up a hill, or 400 HP and 1550 ft lbs and fly up a hill. I'm not ignorant nor stupid, and know what I'm talking about. My last truck was 375 on the pedal and 1550 torque. Never turned it up because I didn't need to. I could pull a hill with the best E model, usually out pull.

HP is mostly usefull at high rpm, flat land, and slight rolling hills. I've been in this too long and been in too many trucks to fall for HP over rules everything else. Those charts are FOS for real world driving. Why is it todays trucks can pull on down to 1000 rpm and hold it? It sure isn't HP alone, it's the torque. Same reason a 318 Detroit had to stay around 1900 -2300 rpm to get anywhere. Decent HP for the time, but no torque, so a driver spent all day shifting gears on every hill.

 

Sorry you don't know what you're talking about. Take two identical trucks pulling identical loads at the same speed, whichever one is making horsepower will go up the hill faster, period. It will actually be putting more torque to the wheels, regardless of how much torque each is putting at the wheels.

The statement "hp is mostly useful at high rpm" puts the final nail in the coffin of your argument.

I have a Detroit making over 600 hp but probably only 1800 tq at most, yet I smoke the 550/2050 c15s up every hill. Pass them on the hills and when they're getting fuel.

What you're saying is no different than saying "my engine revs to 1900 rpms and goes up hills faster than yours". It's one dimension of how fast we can produce work, torque is the other, pit then together you get horsepower.