Mopar1973Man

I hope it works out for you. I'm still very much so on the fence about hybrid or electric vehicles yet. I've just seen anything that can do the mileage like a petro or diesel can.

Yea I get it. Lil' Red isn't being used any longer and was sitting under a tree. 1500 can't haul very much weight and being a short bed even less weight. As for Best and Thor they get used daily they can haul weight and tow the RV. Not to mention both Thor and Beast get better MPG over Lil' Red. Kind of like saying I'm going to buy a Toyota Pirus and going to need a bump rack to haul stuff piled car high. Why not have a vehicle that can do everything? I'll admit Lil' Red was a good grocery getter but that about it.

On the damper there is two tick marks in the damper if it lined up and not wobbling then your fine. Since I did a crankcase vent mod I've never had a damper issue being no oil gets down there.

As injector pop pressure start to drop off below 290 bar typically it picks up a random studder or miss. Mostly will be seen after warm up usually. Even a bad nozzle that is cracked will do it all the time.

Out here I use all gears with the exhaust brake. Some mountain rods are steep with speed limits on some roads as low as 15 MPH.

Check your turbo?

Yup. There isn't any way to tell. Even my 1996 Dodge that @Dynamicbuilt for me looked good inside. Even just opening it up and looking won't tell you much till you take it apart and look at clutches, bands, etc. No way to know...

Last trip out to the woods. I parked the RV tight under the trees and my solar panel couldn't reach the sun at all. Needless to say without any charging power at all I fire up the TV and DVD player and watch TV till I dozed off. Next morning the TV was still going and I still had lots of charge left. LED lighting huge saving in power. My TV and DVD player barely pull any power at all. Since I'm battery powered in both the house and RV it normal for me to check batteries every month. Since I gotta check the main house, I might as well check the RV too. My house (4kw) is nothing more that bigger version of the RV (1.2kw).

Yup. Optimal final ratio is between 3.55 and 3.73. With 35 inch tires on 3.55 is not good. Your final ratio is 3.21 with 35 inch tires. You most likely eat transmissions and have high EGT's. Just a point to make I change from 265/75 R16 to 245/ 75 R16 (30.5 Inch tire) which now bring my final ratio to 3.69:1 on the Beast. This magic of final ratio helped me get my high point 28.04 MPG. Cruising RPM is perfect 2k at 66 MPH, for 550*F EGT's. Acceleration is fast that 3.55 final gearing and pull trailers for about 200*F less EGT's. Big tires look cool but gotta be done right to make it work for you. You would need change ring and pinion to 4.10 for 35 inch tires. This would make your final ratio 3.71 to the ground. To give you a feel of 3.73 to the ground Thor is 265/70 R17 all the way around (stock tires) with 3.73 axles it cruise at 65 at 2,100 RPM. Just ditching the 275/75 R18 tires and wheels gained me a full 4 MPG getting back to the 3.73 ratio. Improper final ratio makes huge problems period... Typically result in higher EGT's, high transmission temps, and higher coolant temps.

Simplest way is to unhook the main power feed to the grid heater on the driver side battery. Takes just a minute or two. It will not throw a code. Any mod that messes with the smaller wires typically will set a P0380 or P0382 code. I know @IBMobilemanaged to do this mod and make it work but, keep it simple stupid (KISS) works out even better. 1/2 wrench remove a nut slip the ring terminal off and tighten the nut back up. Typically I unhook in the spring in April and leave it disconnected till October then hook it back up. It 45*F this morning and both trucks would fire up right now without grid heaters.

IAT and grid heater are not the cause. Both Thor and Beast are currently disconnected. As for white smoke its timing related or injector related. Like I mention somewhere else that a cracked nozzle you can't see but will make it run rough and white smoke I just had this last week with another local friend that wanted +140 HP injectors in his 1994 Dodge Cummins 12V. After his trip to California and it ran good. Now he goes to McCall and blows the head gasket. After doing the head gasket and getting it running the white smoke was bad and running with a mild miss at speed. After pulling all 6 injectors one nozzle was cracked and the other injector had a sticky pintle. After DAP serviced it out we install and problem gone. MAP sensor will not cause white smoke. It will only limit your fueling ability. These trucks will run fine without... MAP sensor IAT sensor ECT sensor The only impact it will have is low power. Limp mode. If a sensor is reporting wrong information say its 50*F outside the ECT and IAT should be close to the outside air temp at first key on. Typically mine matches between IAT and ECT values. Remember that if a sensor goes out of range hi or lo then code is thrown.

ECM is the controller for most. There is a empty pin that is used for the trigger on most kits. Typically most are mounted to the back of the turbo. Your sounds to be a in-line pipe kit. This is not a big thing but your going to need the pipe flanges for said exhaust brake. Like both Thor (BD exhaust brake) and Beast (Jacobs Exhaust brake) are turbo mounted. Now like my buddy down the road from me has a in-line added to his truck (DAP - BD exhaust brake). That kit had two pipe flanges that had to be welded in. Then the exhaust brake clamps to those flanged pipes.

I've done a front bearing a in a friends shop in down in south Idaho. I didn't have access to all the materials I needed. I typically anti-seize everything. Needless to say after one winter and having to pull that bearing again to do wheel joints it was about a 2 hour beating session with a 6 pound hammer to get it out. Anti-seize is a good friend of mine. Typically they come out really easy. Just don't leave anything metal on metal or you'll fight to get it out. I also do use a hone brush to clean up the bearing holes good and clean. All it takes is one winter with road salts and you'll be fighting.

That's the bonus I've got my winter are typically light but when you do get a heavy one I just got to carefully shovel off the snow.

I don't... Heavy snow winters tend to just tear the tarp. Neighbor to the north of me lost there cover in the first winter. The weight of the snow pull it tight and eventually rip from the constant water and ice contact.

Custom rebuild by Blue Top for the 1977 Ford I've been working on. @Blue-Top Steering

This is why the pumps are place on a calibration test stand. It to find the proper timing and tell the rebuilder what key to use. The VP44 will attempt to reach the set timing amount by either advancing or retarding.

This is because BC does not have a Bosch 815 test stand so they have to buy time on someone else's test stand to get the new PSG's tested, calibrated and flashed but each pump takes 3 hours. This is part of the cost problem I'm sure. In a 9 hour day you'll only get three VP44's done.

Last time I checked all RV's have a 12V converter and can maintain the batteries through a winter time. The only thing I've got to do is check the electrolytes monthly. Vehicles don't and require to be driven from time to time or install a trickle charger. Still even then you need to add a trickle charger being vehicles do not come with a 12V converter/charger.

Man I hate those flush style zerks. I've got just the straight needle for greasing like driveshafts u-joints. Just too messy and waste to much grease fighting the needle. Truthfully if I was going to do ball joint I would consider something like @dripley got or another brand setup the same way. Either way I'm past 200k on these...

$85 an hour... I'll do it if you drive out here. Injectors are about 1.5 to 2.0 hours. Head studs a bit more trouble but since the valve cover is off it would be too bad to pull a bolt and replace it with a stud.

I just loved the comments or being punny of "being hosed" that caught me off guard. Sad to say this happens ever day. I just talked to a guy that had a VP44 replaced for over $3,000. Highway robbery true... I've got clients now that refuse to have any one but me work on there vehicles. Again because someone else hosed the owner in a poor repair and charged way too much.

So what do you do for your vehicle batteries then? If my truck can be parked outside in minus temps, why does a RV battery need to be removed if it hooked to power and being trickle charged?

Yes. Ive got a 3 stage converter so there is a storage mode that keeps the batteries at 13.2 volts. Im going to be installing a 30A plug for my RV. Also I've kept my plugged in when at home.