Automatic for tanker?

I drove a company pete with the auto last week while my truck was in the shop. It was a 10 speed eaton and not that bad. I did keep it in manual mode 90% of the time because I didn't like how it would drop to neutral while coasting downhill. It also liked to rev super high 2k+ before upshifting in low range regardless of throttle position. It was nice shifting and I can see why people like them. I only had around 36k in the barrel so didnt notice surge too bad.

Also I would NOT drive anything less than 500hp. In fact if you can, spec the dd16 with 2k ftbls of torque and 600hp. Tankers need the extra pulling power imo, all that surge working against you in the hills...

 

That trans was programmed with the "aggressive" shift pattern. You don't want one with the "eco" shift. It will upshift at 1500-1600 then that puts the next gear at about 1100 rpm. And, dont dare try to pull out in traffic with the "eco" shift pattern. Had to have my last truck reprogrammed to the aggressive.

 

Volvo D13 12-speed auto w. 8500 gallons of water behind it. Works fine. No troubles.

 

I drive a Mack 12 speed auto with M-Drive, if you got some thin liquid in the barrel you can best believe you're going to take a beating starting out, after you get rolling its not to bad sometimes it shifts when it doesn't need to which causes unexpected surge~grade gripper is a plus.

 

We pull ISO tanks with our m-drive Mack's, initial start off can be a little rough, but once it gets moving its fine. Last time I ran one, gentle on the throttle and let it do it's thing.

 

This is the problem I have with my Freightliner auto and tankers. My last one was auto, but had a manual switch. I could and did use manual mode for climbing hills and descents with the jake. My current auto shows a switch than can be used for manual or auto mode, but the switch is disabled, unless the instruction to press and hold the switch to enter manual mode takes more than 6 months of holding it down before it switches.

I climb the hill, speed decays, it downshifts. In the few moments between gears speed decays and product hits the back of the tank and the decrease in speed and jolt causes tranny to downshift. Truck slows further but product hits front of trailer taking some strain off the tranny. Tranny upshifts a too low a speed. Truck won't accelerate or hold speed, so tranny downshifts. Wash, rinse repeat.

One trick I found is the paddle you press down or pull up to force a gear change in auto mode can be pressed and held down to force a downshift and as long as you keep the paddle pressed down the tranny will stay in that gear until you max out the RPMs. You can do the same when upshifting. If you don't do this, my truck will always try to shift to optimize MPG over power. Between holding my accelerator down and the the holding the shift paddle down/up as needed I can avoid the hunting for a gear. I'd rather just have an active switch so I can choose manual or auto mode.

And, I hate reversing with auto and tanker. You either need to reverse at a higher speed than I want or back and stop, back and stop, back and stop due to the tranny stopping reversing as the surge happens or the tires run over the tiniest twig or painted line. It is great in city traffic.

 

I got an automatic recently. It doesn't take long to learn how they shift to avoid surge. Plus there's a manual mode where you just press a button to shift. No more arm or knee being tired in traffic.

 

We're currently running with 51,000 litres of fuel it scales off at 64.5 metric tonne all our trucks are 18 speed eaton auto's never had a problem. oh the only issue was when about a month about something must of cut the cooling line out of the gear box it lost enough oil to get the gear box hot unfortunately there's no gear temp gauge stuffed up the whole gear box think one of the bearing over heated with the low oil.