It’s time to find out which turbo-diesel lifted off-road pickup truck is the king of driving range! To do this – we put a new 2024 GMC Sierra 1500 AT4X AEV Edition and a new Ford F-350 Elevation Off Grid Black Edition on our standardized Denver 100 MPG loop.
The Denver 100
This is a highway ring road around Denver, Colorado with speed limit of up to 75 MPH and an average speed just above 60 MPH. Total driving distance is 112 miles according to GPS. This is mainly a steady-speed highway driving test – something that these high-tech turbo-diesel engines love.
The GMC Sierra 1500 AT4X is equipped with a 3.0-liter Duramax I6 (LZ0) engine with a rating of 305 horsepower and 495 lb-ft of torque. This engine is mated to a 10-speed automatic transmission and a 3.42-to-1 rear axle ratio. This truck is equipped with a 24-gallon fuel tank.
This Sierra is rolling on aggressive 33-inch Goodyear Wrangler Territory MT tires. It has the full AEV steel bumper and 5-skid plate package.
As a side note, we tested the same Duramax engine in a GMC Sierra 1500 Denali a few months ago. It returned a super impressive 31.2 MPG on this same Denver 100 loop.
This new Ford F-350 is equipped with a high-output 6.7-liter Power Stroke turbo-diesel V8. It’s rated at a class-leading 500 horsepower and 1,200 lb-ft of torque. It’s mated to a heavy-duty 10-speed automatic transmission and a relatively efficient 3.31-to-1 rear axle ratio. This Ford has a 34-gallon fuel tank.
As another side note, we tested a new Ford F-250 Tremor off-road package with this same engine several months ago and it produced 19.6 MPG on the Denver 100.
The Elevation Off Grid Black edition rides on 37-inch BFGoodrich KO2 all-terrain tires and fancy Liquid Spring smart suspension. It has an EOG front bumper and a 16.5K-pound winch. This one rides higher than a factory Tremor off-road truck.
Surprise!
The F-350 by EOG returned a respectable 18.5 MPG. This is NOT a huge difference when compared to the stock F-250 Tremor. Let’s do the total theoretical driving range calculation: 34 gallons x 18.5 MPG equals a massive 629 miles of highway range.
On the flip side, the GMC Sierra 1500 AT4X AEV returned an OK 23.5 MPG. This is significantly lower than what we saw in the lower to the ground Denali. Let’s calculate the range: 24 gallons x 23.5 MPG equals an equally impressive 564 miles of highway range.
The heavy-duty diesel pickup will go further on a tank of fuel, but both of these off-road-ready pickup truck will drive further than your bladder will allow you to drive without stopping.
Please join Brenden and I in the video below.
