My Pete rebuild

[Chamberpains]

Ya, those gas line deliveries get interesting. I'm surprised they used Pettibone's to off load. Usually they don't want to damage the pipe in any way. It's good you got tied into descent paying gas line gig to start paying those build folders back. I'll keep my eye open for you when I'm out your way.
This was really cool to watch your whole build process. Thanks for sharing.

[Nostalgic]

Oh no, they used them to load - they use a vacuum machine on the boom of a track hoe to unload. Since they load them pyramid, it's really the only option to keep them damage free. It's not the best paying, but it's something that keeps me close to home, and a pretty straight forward securement to get the hang of things. If I hadn't ran out of route to go home every night, the $$$ all miles to the truck would be a little more impressive, but every day there was some little thing I could take care of that justified coming home. I cut my teeth trucking in Pittsburgh the first time around, so this is a good refresher. Too bad there's no trailer spotting gigs for flatbeds - between having a spread for the first time and being a little rusty, my backing skills could use some work even though I look like a pro at the boat ramps haha. When it jumps pivot from the front to back axle, it just screws me up all kinds of stupid lol. I'm more consistent when I remember to dump the rear axle even when empty.

[Nostalgic]

I finally find myself with a long weekend and no huge pressing issues to address. What a relief - I can finally get my autos in for their overdue services and finally get the winter tires off lol.

I did my first oil change @ 300 miles, then ran my first week under loads. You could almost feel when the rings started seating, but with the oil my turbo was pushing through the cac, I still smelled burning oil when I'd slow down or stop. Last weekend I replaced the turbo, put in a new IMAP, and changed my black oil. My first few weeks, I think oil and filters are on par with fuel as my biggest expenses.

I was starting to think the turbo issues were all in my head, since the slobber was slowing down a lot, but the new turbo made it clear that something was off. With the cac disconnected, the volume of air was significantly higher, no oil sprayed out, and after my first run found that it made 3-4 psi more boost than the old one.

Running 40 qts of Rotella T4 and 1 gallon of Sta Lube. I'm not sure what the current consensus is on oil, but I've considered switching to Carquest 15w40 since it's about $250 a barrel cheaper than Rotella and I'm ready to be done with expensive 5 gallon pails. Not sure how much better additive packs in Rotella really are? and I plan on 10k service intervals and intend to keep using the gear oil.

Oil pressure runs 40-42 cruising, will drop into the low to mid 30's during a hard pull (I notice this happening lesser now that things are starting to break in a little more), and when first stopping to idle 15-18 @ 670 rpms off the gauge (I haven't checked gauge accuracy against insite yet). If I bump it to 900 for a couple minutes to cool, it rests at 20 and stays there when going back to low idle.

The first week I saw 900 a few times on the pyro, but now mid 600's even during a hill (though I don't have any nice long pulls).

Driving it like I stole it, first tank averaged 5.9 by hand, 6.4 via dash readout. Last tank was 6.5 by hand and easing up a little on beating it like a red-headed step child. Not sure if I have it in me to emulate Rawze's discipline in hyper milling, but I'm pretty sure with some achievable restraint and lowering my speeds a little, 7's should be pretty easy to accomplish.

Since I initially based my profitability numbers off $4 fuel @ 5 mpg going into this adventure, I'm happy to be ahead of the curve for something for once.

One thing that's been driving me a little crazy is the coolant tank, and trying to figure out how the compartments are supposed to work? The last set of compartments to the vent cap do not drain back to the system unless you take the tank off and shake it upside down. Should they never have coolant in them? I assume since I kept adding coolant on the fill side, I've overfilled it? Starting with an empty tank, where should I fill to? The Min mark? When it warms up and expands to the other compartments, they don't drain back, so then the main is below the Min mark. No leaks, caps test ok, and I thought maybe it was the dorman tank, so I checked the old OE tank and everything seems to work the same... Goofy system IMO.

[Nilao]

I used to own a volvo with an overflow reservoir...but it would pull the coolant back into the main tank once cooled down...

[Nostalgic]

It's one of these... The coolant fills from right to left, and seems like it has to fill over the tops of partitions. The problem is, once it's "over" the partition, it's trapped there and doesn't pull or drain back to the right side of the tank.

[Nostalgic]

Week 3 under wraps. Oil is still turning black. I collected a sample last week when I changed it to make sure I didn't have any major issues or fuel dilution.

Should I keep changing it until it stays clean, or put another week on it? I have 1700 miles on fresh oil now.

Viscosity and zinc seems a little low?

10 Gallons of Rotella T4 15-40
1 Gallon Sat Lube 85-90 GL-4

[Evotrucker]

My oil is still turning black also after infame.

I changed it after 500-1000 miles, then another time after 1500 miles and then 2500 miles.

After all that it still was turning black :/.... but oil samples showed that nothing was lacking n no black smoke or grayish.

Loved to know if you find a fix for your truck!

[Nostalgic]

With no noticeable soot or fuel dilution, I'll run it another week unless someone here tells me otherwise. I cut the (every) filter open last week and it looked fine.

My security blanket of coming home every night to "fix" emergencies is over now, and I booked myself next week to zig zag down into SC and back. Nothing paid enough to venture to Atlanta area, but really want to make it down so that the pros can either put me at ease, or Mr Hagg can take a hefty deposit haha.

[Nostalgic]

I had no reference on this thing as to how it ran before, what it sounded like, etc., and other than my farm equipment, no diesel experience whatsoever, I missed something that probably should have stood out to me. I know what a Cat 3046 and my little turbo Kubota 'whatever it is' sounds like, but this thing was all new. Is it supposed to sound like that? Or what is the exhaust supposed to smell like? How is it supposed to feel and sound on a hard pull?

Remember, I didn't touch my IFSM at all, and since someone must have replaced all six injectors (date coded 2015), I didn't replace them either. I figured to do the injectors and IFSM, it would have added $8-10k to my build (this was supposed to be a $8-15k total project in the beginning).

Here's the signs I probably missed/dismissed:

1 - On startup/idling it would burn the eyes pretty quickly in the closed garage. (I dismissed this because, well, it puts out a LOT of exhaust compared to my little engines, and my shop is small)
2 - On hard pulls there was a little bit of a "rap rap rap" reverberation from time to time (who knows this may still be there, I haven't put a load on yet today)
3- My dash readout was always a .25+ MPG higher than hand calculations.
4- Exhaust seems to make a lot more soot than it should.
5- A week ago as I was running beside a solid barrier in the left lane, I could hear a knock under load - it was the first time I heard a distinctive knock, and apart from being right next to the concrete barrier I couldn't hear it any other time. I chalked it up to either compressor knock, or my paranoia.

But then when 2/3's of the way up fancy gap when things started to heat up I heard that knock again, only it wasn't faint. After cresting and cooling things off some it wasn't as bad, but any time I was in a pull I could hear it.

At this point, in my mind, I was going to be shopping for a block and eating the core...

Home for a 34, and under a load, I figured I'd check injectors since I didn't have time to handle much anything else. Turns out #6 was bad, and I'm betting that it's been bad all along, just not bad enough to be obvious? Hunter's only had 2, and one looked like it missed QC day at Cummins, otherwise I'd have rather done the back 3 at least... I picked up a set of spare Timing and Fueling actuators just in case - but I simply didn't have time to tear mine down and inspect them - not to mention, I need to find Rawze's videos and do a refresher.

I have a trip to finish today, so we'll see how she does?

Oil is black, so I'm hoping this is the root cause?