I own a 2007 Chevy Duramax and only get about 15-16 miles per gal.. What is the best way to increase it and still keep my warranty?

Check out Banks system. Should be fine with their module system, air intake, and DPF back exhaust. About the only thing other than DPF removal and retune the ECM.

Brian

Install a boost gauge. Keeping the numbers as low as you can cruising around will do wonders. I was suprised how much boost you can add, but not really get that much benefit. I think I increased about 15-20%

I own a 2007 Chevy Duramax and only get about 15-16 miles per gal.. What is the best way to increase it and still keep my warranty?

Mileage depends on where you live (climate, altitude) how good is the fuel you have available where you live is very important.
Most claim MPG increases anywhere from .5-3.0 gains. :rolleyes:
I get anywhere from 13-14 one time 15, mostly around town with very little freeway, I live in hot desert climates.
Any changes I have made(which is much more than what my sig states) netted me maybe a .5 mpg increase, but I did gain kick ass low-mid range power :eek:, when needed. :D

I own a 2007 Chevy Duramax and only get about 15-16 miles per gal.. What is the best way to increase it and still keep my warranty?

There are a lot of factors involved (kind of a loaded question). ;)

My first question is, what type of driving do you do, and are you able to break it out into percentages (e.g., stop and go traffic 80%, freeway 10%, etc.). What is the average distance that you drive each day? I aske because if you are making a lot of short trips in traffic, 15-16 mpg is not bad.

Without knowing your driving habits, the thing that helped me most with increasing mileage was keeping it 65 mph, or slower, on the freeway; gradually accelerating from a stop or to pass; and coasting as much as possible to a stop. Also, short trips are murder on fuel mileage.

sell the truck and get a Honda

I think Banks is going to be your best bet for keeping your warranty intact. Most dealers these days are pretty relaxed about aftermarket mods, but some arent. Banks has a reputable name and some of the dealers that arent mod friendly tend to let the Banks stuff slide. That being said, we have a few customers running the Banks Six Gun and are getting up to 2 mpg improvements. Let me know if youd like a quote on anything.

This is all new to me, I read all this stuff and most of it sounds good if i want to go fast and jump high but really all I'm looking for is something that would help on the milage while I'm towing my 21' toy hauler. Most of my driving is around 80 to 90 % highway and the other town or city. I was just wandering if anyone knew of something simple and fairly reasonable short of buying a knew truck.

As I stated earlier I get 13-14 mostly around town (not been on a solo trip yet), towing my 32' 13,500 lb loaded toy hauler is another story average 8 mpg.
So I feel you are doing pretty good.
Get a gasser and tow with it and just see how bad your mileage will be.
My wifes 07 Denali gets 12.5-13.5 around town, the best was 17 on a trip, so I am tickled to death with what I get.

Lets put it this way. Every duramax truck is different. Exact same truck and configuration and one will get better mileage than the other driven side by side. Now throw on a tuner and run the same level and maybe the one that got the best mileage may end up being worst than the other one that had worst mileage. You may get good mileage on one they call tow or you may not. You may get better on the highest level or not. You just have to try to figure out from there. You could try higher level tunes but watch EGTs and WOT shifts in upper gears.

Now in your first post you mention 15 -16 mpg. Is that unloaded and on the 80 to 90 percent freeway?

Have you pulled the trailer yet and what have gotten in mileage with weight info?

What other truck would you be looking at to get better mileage?

What is your expectation in mileage pulling the trailer and weight?

Does the trailer design cause severe drag?

Brian

The 15 mpg is unloaded and mostly highway and some city. When i towed the toy hauler home empty and about 7 thousands lbs. I got around 7.5 it was over a pretty big summit about 7000 ft. but i live at 6500. I have talked to a few people who was getting around 20 mpg. without towing and that was just a programmer and getting rid of the dpf. I dont really want to do all that I was checking if there was something that might help.

A lot of people claim 20 mpg but could they actually keep a straight face when they claim this :eek:
A few has even claim getting 18-20 mpg towing a 20-24K trailer and was even able to keep a straight face, at least here on the internet anyway.:)

k i know a programmer tunes the ECM and it shows up at the dealer, but does a inline chip show up also like a programmer would?

k i know a programmer tunes the ECM and it shows up at the dealer, but does a inline chip show up also like a programmer would?

People claim they don`t leave a foot print.

ya claims and facts sometimes are different, i would want to know forsure before doing it. Anyone know forsure on this?

How about the basics? Tire pressure, clean air/fuel filters? Tire size? Sounds as your doing as good as most of these guys (including me) on here. If you dream of a constant 20 mpg, keep dreaming. Lotta fish stories around. If your at 15-18mpg, you're the norm, maybe even a tick better.

ya claims and facts sometimes are different, i would want to know forsure before doing it. Anyone know forsure on this?
Edge and Banks are what's called 'harness boxes' meaning they tie into the harness on your truck between the ECM and manipulate data 'on the fly'.
A programmer on the other hand actually writes data to the ECM like GM would do when they do a update; except the programmer calibration will never match GM's and that's where the issues come up.

The ONLY thing I can think of how a harness box can be questioned is the max torque value the transmission has seen (and that's questionable) and the fact they use a Pyrometer.

How about the basics? Tire pressure, clean air/fuel filters? Tire size? Sounds as your doing as good as most of these guys (including me) on here. If you dream of a constant 20 mpg, keep dreaming. Lotta fish stories around. If your at 15-18mpg, you're the norm, maybe even a tick better.
Yeah I am with you there If I get 15 I feel like that was a good tank. Although I do think part of it is your gearing and how fast you drive on the fwy. Like I have 4:10's someone ordered with the truck so if I drive 55-60 its real good really, but I am a 70-75 mph guy so well as you can imagine is it drops greatly the faster you go I average about 14-15 hand calculating to double check what the DIC says and so far mine is pretty dead on. If you have 3:73's you could drive 65-70 and get what I do at 55-60 basicly lol!

The best I have ever got was about 17.5 which was 100% highway non stop for the entire tank on flat ground.