A buddy called me over in Oxford to help with a rough idle on his C15. Long story short, I swapped the fuel filters and it still ran like garbage. Turns out the primary filter housing had a tiny crack letting air in. Took me forever to find it with a hand pump and some dish soap. Has anyone else dealt with air leaks that hide like that?
I ran cheap filters on my 3406 for 6 years. Saved maybe $30 per change. Then last March in Phoenix an oil line clogged from filter media breaking down. Cost me $4,200 for a rebuild on that CAT. My shop foreman showed me the cut-open filters side by side. The cheap one had chunks missing from the paper. Now I only run Baldwin or Fleetguard. Anyone else had a cheap part cost them big money?
I used to think all filters were basically the same, just grab whatever is cheapest. Then I had a customer's 6.7 Powerstroke come back with a tick in the lifters after 5k miles on a budget oil change. Cut the old filter open and found metal shavings caught in the media. The good filter I normally use would have caught that stuff. Has anyone else had a cheap filter let something through they regretted later?
I swapped a rotary injection pump for a Cat 3208 inline pump on a 7.3 IDI last month and the difference in throttle response was night and day. The rotary felt lazy above 2500 RPM, but that inline just pulls hard all the way to the governor. Has anyone else run a similar swap and noticed the same thing?
My buddy Mike who runs a shop in Fort Worth told me to switch to synthetic at 300k miles. Said it would clean out sludge and help with cold starts. Did it last month and my oil pressure gauge reads way better now. Anyone else had good results switching an older engine over?
I was working on a 2005 Cummins ISX last month at a shop in Tulsa. An older mechanic named Dave came over and watched me for a minute, then told me I was setting the timing wrong. He showed me a trick using a dial indicator instead of the timing pin. It was a total game changer for getting that injector pulse dead on. Has anyone else learned a shortcut from an old hand that stuck with you?
I was doing a routine injector replacement on a 2015 Ford F-250 near Boise and heard a weird knock after startup. Pulled the head and found a cracked valve seat that must have been there for months. Anyone else seen this on the 6.7s or did I just get the lemon of the batch?
Bought a reman injector from a place online and it failed after only 200 miles on a Freightliner. Pulled it apart and the nozzle was not even torqued right. Anyone else had better luck just doing their own rebuilds instead of buying reman?
I counted back through my records and realized I've done exactly 500 injector swaps on 6.0 Powerstrokes alone. That's a lot of oil coolers and standpipes too, but the injectors still get me every time.
Guy named Hank at the parts counter told me to run Rotella 15W-40 with a bottle of ZDDP for the first 500 miles. Ignored him, used synthetic right away, and ended up wiping a cam lobe at 300 miles on the dot. Anyone else learn that lesson the hard way?
Customer wanted the cheap route on his 6.0 Powerstroke, so I put in a pulled injector from a parted-out truck and it actually ran fine for 8 months until he traded it in, has anyone else had luck with used injectors or is this just a ticking time bomb?
After 6 months of testing 6 trucks at our depot outside Nashville, the wear metals dropped by nearly 40% on the 10w-30 fleet. Has anyone else seen that big of a swing in their own oil samples?
Used a cheap garden sprayer with a hose fitting to pressurize the fuel tank cap, got air out in 2 minutes flat, has anyone else tried this method?
Stopped for coffee at the Love's off I-40 yesterday and saw a guy fabbed his own aluminum tank with a sight glass. Has anyone else run into a simple shop-made mod that actually worked better than factory parts?
The housing cracked right down the middle and sent shrapnel into the flywheel housing, has anyone else had a Bendix fail like that on an old engine?
I chased a no-start for 7 hours and it turned out to be a ground strap that looked fine. There was a tiny crack under the insulation that only showed when you bent it a certain way. Anybody else had a ground wire drive them crazy like that?
It was a $40 wrench from an online seller, looked just like the good one. I used it to torque down the head on a 6.7 Powerstroke. The wrench clicked, but the bolts were way under-torqued. Head gasket blew after 50 miles, warped the head. The repair bill was over $8,000. I learned the hard way that some tools are not worth the savings. Has anyone else had a tool fail that badly on a big job?
Had a Cummins ISX with a stuck turbo mounting bolt in a tight spot. My choice was to walk back to my box for the bigger 1/2 inch gun or just crank the 3/8 up to full pressure and hope. I went with the 3/8, thinking it would be fine. It made a sad pop sound and just spun. Had to go get the big gun anyway, which took the bolt off in two seconds. Anyone have a better rule for when to just skip the small tool?
I was working on an L5P last week and the injector was seized solid. First I tried the old trick of soaking it in penetrant overnight and using a slide hammer. That got me nowhere after like 30 minutes of hammering. Then I grabbed my induction heater, warmed the aluminum head around the injector bore for about 90 seconds, and it popped right out with way less force. The controlled heat made all the difference. Anyone have a go-to method for really stubborn ones?
Tbh, I was sure it was just a loose hose clamp on the degas bottle. Ended up being a hairline crack in the EGR cooler outlet pipe, buried under the intake. Took me like 8 hours to find it because I kept pressurizing the system cold, and it only leaked when it was at full operating temp. Anyone got a good method for finding those tiny hot leaks without getting burned?
I was at a parts counter last week and heard a foreman from a big fleet shop say, 'Rebuilding injectors is a waste of time now, just swap them.' He said his shop saves 2 hours per truck by only using new units. I get the time thing, but I've fixed so many 'bad' new ones that just needed a clean screen. What's the point of our skills if we just become parts changers? How many of you still rebuild when you can?
I was grabbing coffee at the stop off I-80 and a guy had his hood up on an old F-550. He'd made a coolant filter from a big Baldwin spin-on housing and some heater hose, said it's saved him two head gaskets in the last 100,000 miles. He just drills a small hole in the thermostat housing to tap into it. Has anyone else tried a DIY filter like that, or is a kit just easier?
Installed one on a 6.0 Powerstroke last month, and the customer was back yesterday with a cracked up-pipe. Everyone says these kits solve everything, but skipping the factory EGR system just moves the heat and stress somewhere else. Has anyone else seen exhaust manifold or turbo issues after a delete, or was this just a fluke?
We just pulled the head on a '94 Dodge for a customer, and the cross-hatching was still visible in the cylinders. It made me think, is this just a freak engine or are we too quick to tear into things that still have life? I've seen guys rebuild at 500k just because 'it's time'. What's the highest mileage you've seen on a stock bottom end before a teardown?