Towing Help

[rockman20]

Okay, I have a problem. I don't have enough money to buy myself a decent diesel pickup and I have shoved way more money into mine then what it is worth. So I figure I should maybe build this one to more suit my needs.

Right now here is my setup. 82 Chevy Scottsdale 1/2 ton that now has 3/4 ton axles with 3.73 gears and 3/4 ton springs. The pickup was originally a diesel but the guy before me put a gasser in it. So it currently has a 350 bored 60 over. Chrome Moly rings, aluminum Edelbrock Performer Intake, Holley rebuilt Quadrajet, the cam I am still trying to figure out what cam is in it, (It should of been a Comp Cam Extreme 4 X 4 cam but I have no idea) Mallory billet distributer with stock GM HEI coil, headers with true duals, 2.5 inch exhaust into Flowmaster Delta Series mufflers, 700 R4 transmission that was suppose to have a gas torque converter put in and has gas govenor in it, K & N filter

Here is my problem. On its own this truck moves pretty well. It will pull right around 13 MPG on the highway with the K & N filter (I was having some fuel economy issues before. Putting this filter on got me back to where I was before) The truck has good get up and go and moves pretty well. The only thing is it will barely chirp the tires from a dead stop which I find odd and if you are going about 30 on gravel and punch it to the floor it doesn't really break the tires loose either. And then when you put a trailer behind it, dream on!

I pulled a tandem axle trailer (guessing about a 20 footer) with a New Holland skid steer on it. Wow, what a drag! It would hold 60 to 65 MPH down the road but it took a while to get there and fuel economy dropped to about 6.8 MPG. I just don't think this is right at all! It should be a bit better then that. But maybe I am crazy in my thinking?

I did a compression test on the engine last night. (Engine has less then 20,000 miles on it) First off, the plugs. They all looked pretty good but I am curious as to why they were burning like this. One half of the elctrode was still clean. No deposits at all. The other half of the electrode was a brown, flaky, deposit. It really wasn't built up on the plug, but it was enough that you could flake it off if you scratched at it.

Now for the results. All of the cylinders except for one had an initial compression around 115 to 120. After 4 compression strokes they all topped out around 160 to 175. #1 cylinder however had an initial compression of 90 and then topped off at 160 after that. I don't have a leak down tester so this is as far as I went.

I don't think the above compression results are bad at all. #1 makes me a little curious, but I don't think it is causing my problem.

I am wondering if my problem may not be tied to transmission? I wonder if that converter is not planting my power like it should. I was keeping an eye on my transmission temps and was not impressed by that either. Towing down the highway with a small auxillary cooler in line with the radiator cooler, I was seeing transmission temps right around 200 and at times 210. (This was a 90 degree day though) I am thinking that is kind of high for transmission, but I have never really towed this much before so I guess that I don't know.

I know this is a lot of information, but I am just frustrated with the towing capabilities of this truck. In my opinion it should do better then this. What is my weak link here? Or am I just expecting too much out of my truck?

I'm about ready to call an ad I saw in the local paper. He has a 4 ton tandem GMC truck for sale with the 8.2L turbo diesel in it. That should give me the power I want!