13spd

The 13 speed is a good ride. I80 is pretty tame once you get past Milesburg PA. US 40 in PA is Fort Necessity, it's pretty vertical there. George Washington had to surrender the Fort to Indians back in the 1600's and soon after I think buried his Commanding Officer in the main road somewhere and ran wagons to cover the grave so the indians don't get Coup with the Body.

South Dakota aint bad, winter is coming. I almost lost my life west of Sturgis at the 12 in a winter blizzard white out one bad evening. Stripped the paint from the sleeper.

Washington aint half bad, just 300 miles of farms before you wake up and get into Yakima the hard way to load. OR deliver into Seattle. I just cannot bring myself to go into the NW anymore, if the Cascade Fault system unzips or Yellowstone blows up everything north of Redding CA all the way to Prince Rupert would be a wasteland filled with the dead.

 

Your welcome.

Back to the 13 speed. You over drive or under drive? Or anything at all above the low and high range tree?

 

Ok, I understand a 13 speed this way.

It's a low range with your low gears. Then you have the high range with more gears. When you run out of gears you have a second knob that selects a overdrive. Whoo hoo you got several more new gears to play with. That's your 13 gears.

Here is where it gets tricky.

Under drive means that those trucks are equipped with a sort of half gear You access them by getting onto a mountain uphill, in top gear, you run out of rpms, lift your hammer a little bit feel her shift down automatically giving you half a gear. Put the fuel pedal back on the floor to use it. When the lugging starts, physically move the gear shift to the next gear down. And get back on the fuel. Wait until you start to lug and work your way down through the half gears. if it is steep enough you will reach the low end and at that point it no longer matters how many gears you have... and it becomes a engine oil temperature, coolant temp and especially pyrometer problem until you reach the top.

 

Or something like ..