I am a bit slow, but finally figured out how to drive the mountains

Old cheap me, thinks keep the RPM's down and save wear and tear on the car. Wrong. When we hit the mountains, that is the worst thing I could do. Get the Revs up and get over the mountains. We just came up I 17 from Phoenix to Flagstaff. I thought on no, more mountains. I decided to go after them more aggressively and with a red line on the Isuzu, at 6200, I down shifted into first gear with maxing the rpms at 4000. Made those mountains easily. Key to mountains driving is keep those revs up. Pulled the TM up without even a hiccup. Every one said keep the rpm's p and finally listened. I have always been a bit slow or stubborn. LOL. Hope this helps others. JOhn

[TravelBaum]

That's because you have more horsepower at the higher RPMs.

BTW how are the two Champion generators working. I'm considering going with the same setup. I'm too cheap to fork out over $2000 for Hondas or Yamahas.

[fourteener]

I grew up on the farm, and my Uncle would give me a long talk about lugging (low RPMs) an engine under tow. He said it was the worst thing you could do. It can simply 'pull the guts' out of an engine. Keeping RPMs low is good for fuel economy, but bad for pulling. You want that engine to 'spin like a top.' This is especially true for diesels.
Also, you never want to let an automatic shift from drive to overdrive constantly, as this has the potential to over heat your transmission. It is easier to simply lock the transmission in drive (or the next lower gear). On the first vehicles that had the tow button, that is all it did, it just locked the overdrive out (blocking that as an option).
That is my two cents, and I'm definitely no master mechanic, but I can tell you that I drive the Rockies all the time, and I'm not afraid to keep some decent RPMs when topping the Continental Divide.

[MarkoPolo]

I might add it is at least as important to keep high rpm's when descending a grade as it is climbing. You do not want your trailer "pushing" you down a hill. Much more control when you are in a lower gear.

About the Champion Generators, They work ok. I just had one begin surging from what I think is lack of use. I squirted some carb cleaner and it seem to clear it up. When hooked together, they do work the A/C but I put the big capacitor in which I found on ebay. Nothing to installing it.

Thanks for all advise in keeping up the Revs up.

I remember as a kid my Dad telling me about the importance of building up extra "momentum" going down hill as we traveled the Rockies in Colorado. It was the only way our old school bus converted into a camper could make it over the " hills..."

[rvcycleguy]

I remember a road sign on IH80 in the pass between Auburn CA and Truckee, NV. It said,
" Let it run". To truckers, it meant to let their rigs runout downhill to get as much speed for the next uphill grade.

O ya, plus it is a bit of an excuse to run a bit faster than I normally would...