ISX cm871 in frame overhaul nightmare

[Rawze]

Setting your issue aside for a moment and the screw-up... just generalizing here, not directed at anyone in particular but instead the place you work as a whole based on your post above ...

First and foremost, the shop you work for sounds just like the typical certified garbage-can places full of arrogant, ignorant thick-headed mechanics that are mostly speed gun happy that we scream so strongly against around here. Your post sounds typical of those shops who do nothing but s$it-show workmanship and it cost people their trucking carrers!. The building also likely has a OEM certification or official logo on it somewhere too and this is a big red flag in my book that might as well just say on it "we're dumb as bricks and under-trained and the head mechanic who trains all the rest of us is the worst offender of them all!", let us f$k up your engine even more! by our 'certified' shop and its terrible practices/methods!.

What a complete waste of time to try to learn how to build an engine properly at a shop like that!> , bad practices, etc... you are in the middle of that sh%it-show and you have no outside perspective of actual quality of workmanship to compare it to. That is no environment to learn from and it leads to yet another horribly trained thick-headed mechanic after a few years that is completely full of themselves just like the senior one working there now!... We are quick to run those type of people off around here. We do not tolerate idiots with wrenches who half-arsse shh%it and are under-trained to work on vehicles that cost the typical truck owner as much as a whole house would to straighten out in the aftermath!..

If you actually want to learn how to build an ISX... PROPERLY ... then your not ever likely to get any training past the garbage can crap your post above is screaming is wrong with that shop even in only the few words you have posted so far. Sounds typical of the same old attage of shove it in the bay, replace the bad part, and shove it down the roads so it can come apart again in a year or 2. This is the garbage we see on a daily basis any more by OE shops and others alike and it seems no one wants to build an engine right any more.

I will start pointing out the HUGE red flags with your post above so far so that you can be better educated, .. don't take em to offence, hopefully you are here to learn and stop those bad practices ... but it sounds to me like your always going to be in that bad "certified" hell-hole you seem to be working in.


Here is what I see when reading your post above in general... outside of the Qusestion, etc. you posted...

(12-03-2020 )Derf Wrote:  {working in} northern Alberta, 4th yr apprentice heavy duty mechanic

That area in general is plagued with notoriously bad delete programming for the ISX in general that likes to frets liners (blow head gaskets), kill pistons, abuse turbochargers, etc.. , and all the common failure issues seen with ths ISX engines as a whole due to sheer abuse. Add to that, mostly power-hungry, abusive drivers/owners, in the region and you have a recipe for horrible outcomes in general. There are proper solutions, even if one is deleted... but your not likely to see much of things done right around there just due to the area and environment you live in.

Engines that leave the shop after an inframe, head work, etc. or other major engine repairs caused by abusive delete-programming or other mods done to them. This is in fact "Not fixing the underlying issue" by the repair shop and you can expect repeated failures because of it. - I BLAME THIS ON THE SHOP!!!, NOT THE TRUCK OWNERS!!! -- Most of them have no clue that they have severly abusive deelte-programming in their trucks and most repair shops are way too under-educated to be able to point this out properly. This has nothing to do with power or torque,.. but simply abusive programming that plagues canada as damned near every other truck is deleted up there and had bad programming in it that is harmful to the engine no matter what the HP setting are.

(12-03-2020 )Derf Wrote:  ... worked my way up the ranks these last few years to finally doing my first in frame overhaul! Yay.. I've done a few head gaskets, ...

Just to set the record straight ... a head gaskets on an ISX DO NOT FAIL WITHOUT THERE BEING A LINER FRETTING/DANCING ISSUE!!! -- PERIOD!!!! --- IF A HEAD GASKET FAILS ON AN ISX... IT IS COUNTER-BORE CITY (I.E.> inframe + counter-boring the block) ... AND THE HEAD NEEDS TO BE REPLACED AS WELL, AS IT IS FRETTED TOO!!!! -- PERIOD!!! === IN ALL CASES!!!!!!!!!.

-- If you have ever replaced a head gasket on an ISX and the head was not replaced + the liners pulled out of it and the block counter-bored, shimmed and liner height raised, then ... you have completely wasted your time and the truck owners hard earned cash!. -- That is a huge mistake a lot of shops make on ignorant assumptions based on that completely unreliable liner-height tool method you have been using. "measuring liner height" to determine if a liner has been dancing very very unreliable. Blown head gasket === ALWAYS EQUALS === a liner danced in the block AND RTHAT IT ATE a few thousanths up into the ehad --> Liner Height does not matter at that point, it has to come apart and be fixed properly or all efforts are wasted!.

As well, the underlying issue needs to be found as well! (bad programming, abuse, etc) ... most of the time this is overlooked completely by the repair shop, and the engine fails again in a few short years ... again,.. all at the expense of the truck owner who is simply trying to make a living with the now unreliable quality of workmanship and no one ever solving the cause if it all.

(12-03-2020 )Derf Wrote:  Our shop had built a cylinder liner installer tool to clamp down the liners for measurements, works perfect on single over head cam engines. But this double over head cam engine the tool does not work for cylinder #1

Even the cummins official certified liner height compression tool has this same issue. I know, I have one and it came from cummins themselves tis way. i purchased the official tool for doing inframes right from them, as expensive as it was vs. something aftermarket.

Here is the actual certified tool that I ordered from cummins and its issues.... beginning at 7:09 in this video, i talk about it. if i had not cut the leg off it and modified it, then it would have caused the same issue you say you got yourself into...



The video also mention 50-ft.lbs torque when checking liners, cummins updated this to 100 ft.lbs but this still is an unreliable method to detect liner fretting.

I did not also mention mention that I had ground a flat on the one side of the tool to allow for the gear cover clearance.. I forgot to mention that in the video, but I had to do that as well. Looking at the tool in the video shows that ground corner on the one side.

Just an FYI for future reference.

(12-03-2020 )Derf Wrote:  ...i stripped out a headbolt hole...
... 1/2 good threads...
...i could do the 300ft/lbs PLUS the 90 ...
... I was told everything should be ok. ...

NO-- IT WILL NOT BE OK!!!!... Cummins makes a tool and procedure to correct this. Like others mentioned, that is the proper solution. Anything less and your wasting your time and your customers money completely!

For another mechanic who is supposed to be traing you to tell you this,.... THEY ARE THE PROBLEM!!! plain and simple!!! ... Anyone can make a mistake... that is how we learn mus=ch of ther time,.. by making mistakes.. that is not the real issue ... IT IS HOW YOU GO ABAOUT CORRECTING THAT MISTAKE AND GO ABOUT ENSURING IT NEVER HAPPENS AGAIN that is actually what is important. - This is the golden rule in machining and mechanic work.. and it clearly is being abused and broken at that shop your at and this is a huge red flag that tells me that I, nor the 4,000+ people of this forum should never ever a truck to that shop for service work -- !!! EVER!.. Not because of the mistake,.. but because of the abuse of what to do to correct it and the no-give-a s$it attitude clearly that was placed forward without regard to the $20,000+ dollars someone is going to suffer because of half-arssed decisions after it happened!.-- This is the abuse and garbage-can ways that shops get caught up into that cost people their trucking careers!.. because you know damned well as i do that if that head lets go in 2 or 3 years,.. the shops doing the work is NOT GOING TO REPLACE THE BLOCK FOR FREE because they took that shortcut and said "it'll be ok"... (makes my blood boil over just reading that part of your post).

- YOU are a part of that shop and its clearly s$irt-show practices... Hopefully, this bit of perspective points you back into the right direction towards the importance of doing things the right ways, and when a mistake is made... THE PROPER SOLUTIONS ARE MET!!!-- PERIOD!!!--- because anything less,.. and you should not be working on professional/commercial equipment.. go find a hot-rod shop somewhere and work on car engines where people don't give a damned if something is half-arssed and people's entire career is not relying on you making the right decisions.. this is the road that leads down and so you should well know now that what your shop is doing, and its practices are VERY VERY WRONG!

If I had worked there, that mistake was made,,.. and the head mechanic of shop foreman said that to me,.. I WOULD HAVE WALKED THE F$UCK OUT AND TOLD THE CUSTOMER EXACTLY WHY I DID SO THAT THEY FULLY WERE AWARE THAT THEIR EQUIPMENT WAS AT RISK OF REPEATED FAILURE AS WELL!

[Rawze]

Now, with that out of the way...

FIRST AND FOREMOST... If the head is removed from an ISX .. IF THE COUNTER-BORES ARE NOT CUT AND THE LINER HEIGHT RAISED TO AT LEAST 0.015", up form 0.010", then YOU HAVE DONE ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO EXTEND THE ENGINE'S ACTUAL LIFE-SPAN AT ALL to ready it for its next million miles of expected use after the inframe!... YOU HAVE GAINED PRETTY MUCH NOTHING! towards extending the engine's life. Does not matter what condition the mid-stops were in.

- This also means REPLACING ANY HEAD THAT IS MORE THAN 435K MILES OLD (wear, age, and compression loss due to valve seat wear, etc has now started setting in) .. OR IF THE HEAD GASKET FAILS ON ONE!!!... This is because first and foremost,.. the head gasket will never fail unless it was defective (and it failed very early in the engines life from the factory or it is an aftermarket garbage gasket) ... unless a liner moved... PERIOD!. There is no exception to this.. it has never been seen!. Many shops that replace only head gaskets are just not trained enough to spot fretting wear properly and all they do is a simply check of liner height like complete fools and let it go. this is because liner height check alone is not nearly reliable enough to show the the actual cause of failure in many cases. Like dumrarsses! they change only head gasket and even worse,.... try to re-use the head, ... because they never bother to check for the 0.001" to 0.002"+ fretting wear that occurs on the bottom of it where the liner was sitting. This is much harder to spot, but can be checked for. -- Like I said... complete lack of proper training and lack of education towards the precision these engines need to be done properly!.

And since a liner moves to cause the head gasket to fail.. it ALWAYS FRETS A FEW THOUSANDTHS OF AN INCH UP INTO THE BOTTOM OF THE HEAD!!! ... the the holding/clamping force for that cylinder will be a couple thousandths shy in that area,.... might as well have the wrong liner height.. this is what it is the equivalent to. - here is an example...
http://rawze.com/forums/showthread.php?t...48#pid7648

and it also DOES NO GOOD to replace the cylinder liners, pistons, etc.. on an ISX whatsoever during an inframe IF THE BLOCK IS NOT COUNTER-BORED!.. it does not matter if the liner height is up to cummins spec., or of it does not look like it has ever fretted... NOT COUNTER-BORING IT WILL NOT EXTEND THE ENGINES LIFESPAN -- so.. THIS MEANS THAT WITHOUT COUNTER-BORING AND RAISING LINERS, THE ENTIRE OVERHAUL-- only stopped any oil consumption issues and nothing more!. IT DID NOT EXTEND THE ENGINE LIFE ONE DAMNED IOTA AND IT WILL STILL HAVE TO COME APART IN HALF ITS EXPECTED TIME FRAME because no one counter-bored it AND THE MID-STOP FINALLY WORE IN ENOUGH DUE TO AGE AND USE WITHOUT BEING RE-MACHINED AND RAISED.

I see shops do this like mad, then the truck owner is wondering 3 or 4 years later why his engine has to be inframed yet again!, blaming the engine instead of the lack of proper workmanship by the place that could have made that difference towards building it into another million mile engine.

- A minimum liner height if 0.014" - 0.015" should be used/set with counter-boring every time an engine comes apart and it has more than 400k miles of run time on on it already. This is a MUST if you want it to last a full million miles the next time around without fail, and especially now that they all have brass shims and anti-carbon rings now . You loose 0.001" - 0.0015" just in the brass shim crush alone when he head to torqued. ... Anything less, and your just wasting someone's time and money!. - People spend upwards of $20,000 dollars because they EXPECT A POSITIVE RETURN ON THAT INVESTMENT into their equipment,,. and they can't get that if in 3 or so years, they have to spend this much all over again. I blame the shops and their serious lack of understanding on these engines for this and it can totally be prevented by using better procedures and standards.


- NEXT::: Is the fact that most shops any more will not let the head gasket crush properly on the ISX... I guess the ways of proper engine rebuilding have been thrown out the window these days. -- WHEN the head is installed... and then torqued to 300 ft-lbs.. IT NEEDS TO THEN SIT OVER NIGHT FOR THE HEAD GASKET TO CRUSH!... THEN THE NEXT DAY, THE 300-FT.LBS DONE A SECOND TIME... BEFORE MOVING THE BOLTS TO THE +90 DEGREE POINT!. MOST OF THE TIME, THE BOLTS WILL TURN A BIT MORE THAT NEXT DAY BECAUSE THE HEAD GASKET SETTLED AND CRUSHED PROPERLY!.. Most shops are in too much of a goddamn hurry to do this any more and don't bother.. then wonder why the engine has issues again.

And lastly.. ON ALL HIGH COMPRESSION ENGINE MODELS-- Cm2250, 2350, X15, etc... after 400k miles of run time,.. if the pistons have to come out for any reason.. THE BRASS WRIST PIN BUSHINGS IN THE RODS NEED TO BE REPLACED!!! PERIOD!.. THE higher compression ISX engines have already been seen to have accelerated wrist pin bushing wear, so if this is not done, it will be a ticking time bomb waiting to send a piston thru the block about 600 - 800k after the in-frame and ruin someone's day unexpectedly.