Will Welsh – 2019 Chevrolet Duramax High Country

There was a Facebook post in the Banks Derringer L5P Owners group earlier this month from a Mr. Will Welsh sharing a recent experience he had with his truck. His Derringer equipped 2019 Chevy Duramax pickup pulling a 48-foot enclosed trailer from Oklahoma to Kansas ran into some pretty bad weather.

“We have a house just north of Tulsa, and we have a cattle ranch and farm in the Northwest part of Kansas,” explains Will. “I had some equipment that I needed to get from Kansas to Oklahoma so that I could work on it all winter long if needed. We take our enclosed trailer over there and normally we’d pull it with a semi back and forth, but with the weather being as bad as it was, we decided to pull it with our trailer and the pickup this time. Let me stress again that the weather was horrible. That was one heck of a fun trip…” he said sarcastically. When asked to elaborate on the “fun” of his trip Will took a breath and continued, “I have never just about messed my pants in my life as I did with that trip. It was crazy!”

Will has a lot of trucks between both states and they are part of the backbone of the family operation. That means he has high expectations of the vehicles. “We stay very busy with our cattle, and we haul them all over the country. As it is, we travel between Oklahoma and Kansas every week or two. We commute something like 60,000 to 70,000 miles every year. I don’t drive my trucks super easy. They get worked hard from day one till the day I decide to park them or get rid of them.” Older trucks with higher-mileage usually get their beds taken off and spend their days on the ranch until they give up the ghost.

As you can see Will expects his trucks to work, not be racers. He does, however, want them to perform well. “I like to drive 85 mph. I’m not going to race it to get to 85, and if it takes longer then so be it. The Derringer made quite a difference though. The truck handled the fully loaded trailer and the weather well. The extra boost from the Derringer was a great help and confidence booster as I easily scooted to the speed I wanted.”

Will finished his story with one extra bit on the Derringer: “I have a 2017 and my 2019 is not only more powerful and fun to drive, but it gets way better mileage. I’m averaging close to 20 mpg, and all I have on it is the Derringer with iDash Super Gauge. Either this thing is a factory freak, or the vehicle is running more efficiently because of Banks. It’s always on level 6, I never adjust it at all.

The only truck that I’ve ever had that has gotten close to this was my old-school ’99 Power Stroke that didn’t have all of the emissions equipment. On this trip towing an overloaded steel trailer in terrible weather with one hell of a headwind we averaged 12 mpg, which is unheard of! It’s crazy, because if I was hauling that load with my Peterbilt or Kenworth I would have gotten half that!”