Originally Posted by 44MTI (Post 4154173)

If you make this purchase you will really like the new truck. The interior and amenities are great. It will also toy much better as GM has really improved the frames and suspension on these trucks. The biggest change will be the power, the torque on these new rigs is incrdible and they tow great.
Where I think your going to be let down is in the milage. They do pretty good empty, but when you put a load like that with all that wind resistance they go down hill very fast.. I have a 2011 duramax that I tow a 41' cyclone toyhauler with. I never see better than 8, even if I set the cruise on 78-80. If I pull faster, which it will do with ease, it will drop to 6-7 pretty quickly. I even put a chip and urea delete on it for a while whch picked it up to 9ish driving pretty fast. But it ended up getting exhaust residue all over that side of the trailer so it wasn't worth it to me. I know plenty of people with these trucks pulling trailers every weekend and all the ones I trust to tell the truth are getting about the this same mileage.
Not trying to be negative, as I love this truck and would never want to get rid of it. Just letting you know what to expect from someone who does it almost weekly.

Originally Posted by t500hps (Post 4154101)

WOW, at least you gave it a couple days to make a decision! :)

I would have said stay with the 8.1. $30K would have bought a crap load of gas. Considering your per 100 mile fuel cost would be

8.1: 100 miles at 7mpg = 14.2 x 3.50 or $49.7 fuel costs
6.6: 100 miles at 11mpg = 9.1 x 4.00 or $36.4 fuel costs
$0.135 per mile more fuel cost

If the new truck cost $30K more than your old one then you'll need to drive nearly 225,000 miles to "break even" with the fuel savings. Now, sometimes we just want a shiny/new truck........fuel cost just helps us justify what we want! :)