Over a year later! Wow.

So my wife and I have been having a lot of fun camping, but a little over a year after purchasing our Silverado 2500 HD, I did something a little crazy.

The 2500 was EXCELLENT for towing.  In fact, the truck weighed MORE than the travel trailer itself.  Nothing moved and it was super stable.

HOWEVER

Driving around town, driving to work, in parking lots, etc.  The 2500 was a pain in the behind.  It had a huge turning radius, it was long, it was wide.  It was also very tall and Sandi had a hard time getting in and out of it, and she would never drive it.

A few weeks ago I made a snap decision to "downgrade" my truck to a 2026 GMC Sierra 1500 Elevation model with the Duramax 3.0 diesel engine and the Max Tow Package.  The result of this was:

1. Much much easier to drive when NOT towing.
2. WAY better mileage (my current tank is at 29 MPG).
3. My wife can not only get in and out of it easily, she is willing to drive it!
4. Has lots of amenities (more than I would ever need but, nice nevertheless).

The drawbacks are minimal.  I had to rejigger my weight distributing hitch for the trailer, that was a little bit of a process.  I had to adjust the trailer brakes, still not sure they are where I want them.  I can feel the trailer behind us now.

The GMC tows with great power, that is not the problem, and the hitch stabilizes trailer movement, but I can still just feel it a little more than I could with the 2500 HD.  BTW even towing I got 14 MPG on one trip.  That is crazy to me.

I also added Timbren's to the rear, to assist with stabilization.  But I added those to the 2500 HD as well.

After a couple outings towing, and about 1000 miles, she has not burned a drop of oil.

Now I just need to worry about the current thrust bearing issue (bad parts) some people are seeing.  It seems to have come in specific batches of trucks and if I see the issue, it will be in the first few thousand miles.  But so far no one with my build date has reported the issue so... that is comforting.