Second and third Generation Dodge Ram 4×4 trucks have a weak front end. Steering suffers early on, and can rapidly deteriorate into what is known as the Dodge Death Wobble.
People throw a lot of parts at Dodge Rams trying to get them to steer. If you have the Dodge Death Wobble and you live in Northern California, seek help Bay Area Diesel Service
My Dodge truck has had a few fuel related issues over the past year and half I’ve owned the truck. Some of these issues were related to a bad mechanical fuel pump that was putting out less and less fuel pressure, and one of the issues was directly related to a bad batch of BioDiesel, and yet another was related to fungus in the fuel that the previous owner had suffered from. To help diagnose these issues, and determine if and when I was having fuel pressure issues, I decided to install a fuel pressure gauge. I also went to my favorite Diesel Forum to ask for help in getting some answers.
In the cab electronic gauges are very expensive, and I couldn’t see dropping over $200 for the occasional diagnosis of fuel pressure problems. Mechanical gauges are much more affordable, but I would not run fuel inside of the cab of my truck. The answer turned out to be installing a mechanical fuel gauge in the engine compartment and taking an occasional gander at the gauge to make sure it wasn’t past time to change out a filter, or to diagnose another problem.
Looked around and found Marshall made just the gauge I was looking for. And it was pretty cheap at under $30, but looks to be of very nice quality, complete with being filled with silicone to protect the gauge against wild swings in pressure. Folks on several diesel forums recommended the gauges, and so I ordered one up. I hooked it up along with a TorkTek snubber at the Injection Pump, where the fuel enters at a banjo. The snubber is supposed to reduce the pulsing of the fuel from the mechanical pump, and to prevent destroying mechanical fuel gauges. From there I attached a grease gun hose that was about 15″ long, and then to a 1/8″ female pipe thread adapter, and then to the gauge. I hung the gauge from a rubber hose using two zip ties, to reduce any vibration from the engine. This seemed to work although the needle of the gauge swung 5-10 psi on either side of the target pressure. The snubber was obviously not snubbing the pressure quite enough.
Left the gauge on the truck and couple months later the gauge failed. Most of the silicone leaked out of the gauge, and of course the swinging of the needle was even more erratic. Returned this gauge to the place I bought it from and they sent me a new one. Installed this gauge, and in a few more months I trashed this one also, only this time the truck blew out the rubber plug at the gauge, and broke the needle. I think the plug went first, and then the needle just beat itself to death from the wildly fluctuating fuel pressure.
Contacted Marshall and they kindly replaced the gauge. In hindsight I think they went above and beyond the call of customer service on this one. The wildly fluctuating fuel pressure of my Cummins was just too much for any mechanical fuel pressure gauge with my set up. And I also wonder about the effect of Biodiesel on the rubber seals of the gauge. The literature makes no mention of using Biodiesel. Biodiesel is hard on some rubber parts and so I think it’s reasonable to think maybe a gauge directly exposed to Biodiesel will eventually fail due to swelling or softening of the rubber.
This time at the recommendation of Rob at TorkTek, I used a 30″ or so piece of marine grade fuel line instead of the shorter grease gun hose. And I used some parts left over from a Turbo Waste Gate project.
It goes together like this:
1. TorkTek Snubber at the fuel injection pump at the banjo.
2. brass hose barb that has a very tiny pinhole size orifice.
3. 30″ of marine grade hose.
4. a second brass hose barb with tiny pinhole size orifice.
5. 1/8 x 1/8 female to female pipe thread adapter
6. Marshall Fuel Gauge
After installing all of this and sealing all threads with Permatex #2 sealer, I started up the truck, and got a non-fluctuating 20psi. Adjusted the TorkTek OverFlow Valve I have on the Injection Pump so I ended up with a non-fluctuating 35psi. Fantastic! No more gauge getting beat to death from fluctuating fuel pressure.
Life is good!
Yep, the Dodge with the Cummins and it’s massive torque are mighty hard on a stock transmission. I’m budgeting for a Heavy Duty Automatic Transmission Rebuild in Northern California at Left Coast Diesel over in Concord, CA (North East San Francisco Bay).
My friends over at Left Coast Diesel specialize in high performance and towing transmissions for Dodge trucks and are 6.0 liter Ford Experts, with over 200 Ford 6.0 Diesel Head Stud Jobs to date.
Goerend & Suncoast Transmissions!
NorCal Diesel Forum • Cummins • Duramax • PowerStroke • High Performance Diesel Engines
I’ve been burning 100% B100 BioDiesel for several weeks now, and so far so good. The truck seems to like it just fine, though my mileage appears to be down at least a couple miles per gallon. I suppose this is because the BioDiesel has less BTUs. At any rate, the exhaust smells better, especially once it’s warmed up. I have a 55 gallon drum of the stuff along side the 55 gal drum of 100% WVO already de-watered and filtered to 1 micron. Question is do I continue to burn the BioDiesel and eventually set up my own BioDiesel Appleseed processor, or do I take a chance and blend the two and keep my fingers crossed that I don’t sludge up my valve train and Bosch P7100 injection pump. These things are expensive and the heart and lungs of the Cummins.
Speaking of Sludge, I have been getting a Water In Fuel (WIF) light on the dash. I immediately thought that I may have gotten a bad batch of BioDiesel. I was warned by several folks that I’d go through a couple of fuel filters when I started running BioDiesel, because it’s a very powerful solvent and will clean out my tank, fuel lines etc. The old Dino Sludge will be cleaned out, and clog up my filter prematurely until the system is sparkly clean. So I drained the fuel filter bowl yesterday into a clean mason jar, and then pulled the fuel filter. Fuel Filter didn’t look so dirty, though there was some sludge in the fuel filter bowl. There was one pea sized chunk of white spludge looking stuff, that I suspect was shorting out the WIF wires. There was NO water in the fuel. This the second time in a week that I’ve drained the bowl, and neither time did I find water. Put in a new filter and have set aside the jar of biodiesel along with a jar of WVO to see if anything settles out over the next week or so. Then I’ll put them both in the fridge and then the freezer and see if they solidify or separate.
While I was at it, I removed the bowl from the fuel preheater to replace the filter/strainer. Oh, oh. There’s sludge, and this is not the good kind of sludge. This is black slimy stuff that is fungal in nature and is known for doing some serious damage to fuel systems. This very truck had it’s own fuel tank dropped a year or two ago, when the previous owner got a bad batch of Diesel. He paid a bunch of money to have the whole fuel system purged and cleaned. He then ran an additive in his fuel every fill up to kill off any remaining nasties. Well the dealer missed this filter.
I am pretty sure this bug didn’t get introduced with the BioDiesel, rather it was old funk that was missed. At any rate the BioDiesel in the tank got a double dose of anti-fungal treatment. This stuff is NASTY. I wonder if there is any other of this stuff in the fuel system.
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