Leaving for Florida this week. Need some advice on the long trip?

[DalesCarpentry]

I will be leaving for Florida this week. I will be towing my 21 foot travel trailer with my 1998 Chevy 1500 Silverado with the 4.3 Liter Vortec engine in it. This has been a very good truck and I change the oil every 3000 miles or so. I try to keep up with the maintenance and keep it in good working order. The problem is I'm going to be making this 900 mile trip and my truck has 195,000 miles on it now. It only uses a half a quart of oil between oil changes and like I said it runs great. With this many miles on it now I'm afraid anything could happen at anytime. I was talking to my boss last week about the up coming trip and said I was thinking about getting a lot of sleep prior to the trip and drive straight through. I did this many times when I was younger and only stopped to get gas and use the bathroom so I know I could make the trip straight through if I wanted to. He said he thought driving straight through might be hard on my truck. What do you guys think? Should I drive 2 or 3 hours at a time and stop and let the truck cool for an hour on my trip down there? I have to say it will be an easy trip because I'm pulling my home behind me and if I do get tired I can just pull over and go to sleep in the trailer for a couple hours. I do have to get my front drivers side wheel bearing replaced prior to leaving and thats going to be expensive. It's $135.00 just for the part because the whole hub has to be replace not just the bearing. Then everyone I talk to wants between $150 and $250 to install it. My serpentine belt and hoses look good. I just replaced the starter a couple weeks ago and the alternator last year. I also replaced the rear end in it a year ago. The transmission shifts good as it should and don't thing there will be any problems with it. My radiator has a transmission cooler built into it so that should help keep it cool. I changed the oil in it about 1500 miles ago so it's not due to be changed before the trip. Am I missing anything. I just don't want to break down in the middle of nowhere and not have the money to fix it. Thanks and take care Dale

[bulletstuffer]

Driving straight through is for the young  and those that are always in a hurry.  Unless you have an appointment sit back drive 50 mph  take several days and enjoy the scenery:)  This will cost you less and give you some time to reflect.  I would also recommend AAA in case of a break down.  That is cheap insurance.

Good luck,

Bulletstuffer

[DalesCarpentry]

I have AAA for my insurance company and I also am a member. I do need to upgrade it though to cover my trailer. Thanks Dale

[briarpatch]

A straight through trip will be eaiser on the truck than any stop and go driving in town or else where. 
Get in the truck and go.

[GatCat]

If you have the trailer heavily loaded, you might want to consider an auxilary tranny cooler, these look like a little radiator, and mount in front of the radiator. You also might want to consider an additive for the tranny fluid, there is one ( forget its name ) that many tranny shops use ( I think it is "Lube-Guard").
Unless you are pressed for time ( doesn't sound like it ), I would not suggest  driving straight through, fatigue highly increases the chances of driver error, causing a wreck. At each stop, do a walk-around, check tire pressure, fluids, etc. Be sure to check trailer tire pressure, and make sure the trailer hubs have been greased. Check tongue/ball ( sounds kinky ). Check trailer lights. Make sure battery cables are tight and clean, especially the ground wire meeting frame. This is a good time of year to travel, heat is hard on loaded vehicles.
Should have no problems.
Mark

[SHOOTALL]

put a qt of Lucas oil treatment in when you change oil. Also in the transmission ( trans treatment) if you need to add some. The stuff works.

[BBF]

This may be old hat to you:
Whenever I pull a long grade I will lock it into a lower gear. Higher rev's with less throttle is easier on the engine and tranny then having it labor in a top gear. If you need to slow down so be it.  Can you get a can of Liquid Moly in your place. It is great stuff.
 
Those small aux. Tranny coolers do help.
 
BTW. When doing long trips and for me going to Florida is much longer then for you, Ill put 20W-50 in my vehicle. I do not and probably never will use 5W-30 unless I was up in the interior of Alaska or the NWT. IMO that is recommended only to achieve good fuel ratings for the Mfg.

[SHOOTALL]

scatterbrain , about the oil , I felt the same as you , 10-30 in everything. But I have been trying both 5-30 and 5-20 in two one ton and a 3/4 ton truck. We spend alot in fuel each mo. I checked with mechanics and they say the new engines are built to better tolerances and wok better with the specfied oils . They say this is why they don't need break in or warm up . We have over 10000 on one with 5-20 and more on the one with 5-30. They do get better gas milage all carry alot of weight . One tows alot. We do use synthetic oil. Something to consider with prices the way they are.
Two things I would caution though 1- don't change vis on an old engine 2 don't go to syn on an old engine.

[BBF]

Shootall:
I have been looking at the Syn. Oils myself having a new vehicle ( small car)with about 2000 miles on it now. Syn Oil comes in 10w something I believe. For 4 liters or 1 Gal depending how it is sold will run between 38 to 43 bucks up here. The semi blends are less but not by much.
 
Add Environment disposal fee, a filter for about $ 12 and in my case 15% sales tax and even a "do it yourself" oil change needs to be budgeted.
 
For me to do that would require a 6000 mile interval to make it worth the expense. I have no clue if that is practical.

[SHOOTALL]

With amsoil you can go 12000 miles change the filter add 1 qt and go another 24000 miles then change both filter and oil. I use syn in work trucks we go about 7000 miles the change both . So have put off changing and passed 10000. Up until this year we changed at 6000 but cost made us extend .
My take on a blend - it is no better than dino oil as it is only as good as its lowest componet.
Check out the Amsoil site . It has good info. It is the syn oil we started with years ago. Due to cost we now use NAPA syn oil with no ill effect.

[BBF]

 
Will check out NAPA, we have them here. Never heard of the other.

[SHOOTALL]

Ams-oil was one if not the first in the US to sell syn oil. They sell thru. jobers mostly. Most mechanics discount the use of syn. oil as it reduces the repairs. As example we had a guy run a truck over 80000 miles with out changing oil only added oil. The engine failed. It was a truck with a 100000 mi warranty. GM would not stand behind it ( I don't blame them) . At that point we went to syn oil . While using syn oil we experinced no failures in engines , trans or rears . note we used syn oil in all three. Later as a cost savings we went back to dino oil and experinced a couple trans failures and an engine failure. Also we lost 3 rears. We have since gone back to syn oil and experinced no failures. We run our trucks quite long as some ( ford) are over 250000 miles. We run Chevy , Toyota , Dodge and Ford .