Wild and Free

A group of engineering students are standing outside their class room looking at the flag pole, for their daily assignment they needed to find the height of the pole, they were at it for hours trying to figure out how to measure how tall the flag pole is coming up with no unanimous decision when the janitor walks by and asks what they are up to, after they explain their task to him he asks why they just do not unbolt the base and lay it on the ground and measure it. To that one of the students looks at him and says " But then we would be measuring how wide it is and not how tall it is". There you have the mentality of an engineer.

I torch the cross out and then tap the cap in and then pull the clip. Use this method with all u-joints anymore, the newer ones are held in with a plastic epoxy that needs to be melted out anyhow.

I think I changed out the factory ones at around 50K miles and the Moogs at about half that even on my 1995 1500 I went through 1 factory and 2 moogs by the time I sold it with 110K on it but I ran 285-75-16 for about 80K of those. I had the same symptoms on all three 2nd gens I had when the end link went bad it felt like someone banging on the floorboard with a hammer on rough roads, was very annoying. With the lukes link on the track bar end you still have a similar pitman ball joint that needs adjusting and can still wear out if not kept up on. With a 3rd gen style it has a bushing on the end and does away with the ball socket style end link.

BD has good stuff, that is what I ran in my 02, I had their VB and single disc converter and it held my 560 hp 989 tq for many years until I sold it with no issues even though the converter was rated at 450 hp and 750 tq it did good for me while power pulling for several years and running the drag track a few times.

They are very common on large mining equipment, like stated above there are good and bad things associated with them. The only OTR trucks I have seen them on were older Fords where the engine was mounted in the frame at an angle, laid over on their side a bit.

There would have been a new 2014 2500 Ram with the new 6.4 l Hemi in the driveway before any conversion on a half ton. I have been hearing a lot of awesome stuff about the new 6.4 in the 2500 Rams, a coworker test drove one last week and fell in love and now has his 03 cummins for sale. Dang thing came out of it all except for the noisy cab fan which I have a replacement laying on the bench in the shop for it. I did have to replace a torn CV axle boot the other day too but that was from having the adjustable height Bilstein struts at full height which I dropped down one setting and realigned it now it handles better too.

Mike, I was thinking about that as well but he said the issue was present before he rebuilt with all of the internal mods and has continued even after the rebuild.

Yes definitely replace the converter with an aftermarket this is the weak link that kills the tranny, also go with an aftermarket valve body right away too, this will help the overall performance of the tranny and make the new converter a lot happier too in the long run.

Sorry if I offended you, you are new here and don't know me yet.. I have been a heavy diesel tech for 20 years and have worked at 2 dealerships myself and was a field tech working out of a service truck for about 7-8 of those years. I just pointed out the obvious, you said it not me. it is not the dealership that is the issue it is the people who work there that give them bad names. I have seen and known incompetent people at Cat dealerships as I have at Auto dealerships and visa versa I have seen the most talented techs at dealerships also. The problem with auto shops is that their work is based on flat rate and they get greedy and take short cuts and just throw parts at things as that is what fixes a majority of issues and when it comes to having to spend time on troubleshooting which cuts into the flat rate profit of the individual tech then they just turn a blind eye and say they can't fix it. But I have seen this attitude from a lot of heavy equipment techs as well, some schools teach basics and do not touch on troubleshooting This is where bigger Cat dealerships shine they have awesome training facilities. Our local Dealer Butler Cat has an awesome facility in Fargo ND which I have been lucky enough to have taken classes at myself through a deal the mine I work at hashed out with them. I know 2 awesome techs at our local Dodge dealership and they will go out of their way to help me with strange issues like the one you are having, I have had a couple stumpers they helped me work out, we have gone for drives together as I could recreate the issue or point out a subtle issue they could not and we then narrowed things down from there, one needs to work with the dealership not drop it off and leave, sometimes this is the difference in getting something fixed or not, not all problems are clear cut. As a tech I have spent as much time riding with customers over the years trying to get a handle on issues as I have done self diagnosis. I am not knocking you, anyone who has been around any of several diesel forums knows that I am just joking around a lot and don't let people get away with saying things in general when one should be looking in a mirror when doing so. Take my advice serious but let what you see as insults go past. I am not out to insult anyone personally it just comes out that way as I am a blunt straight forward type of person with a different sense of humor, I tend to catch things most others don't, my wife hates that quality,I find it fun. You don't know of anyone with a scanner you could borrow? Heck a lot of diesel techs I know or have worked with over the years have more automotive test equipment than a lot of auto shops have as a lot do sideline moonlighting work on the weekends or evenings / heavy work during the day and light automotive and miscellaneous work in the off hours.

And yet you work for one lol! Find and auto shop or demo a snap-on reader with snap shot capability then.

I almost took the tip of my index finger off about 15 years ago while folding a 4" schrade lock blade knife up not paying attention, cut half way through the end joint by the tip, was too stubborn to go to the doctor but it did heal itself after a month but I didn't get full feeling back into the tip for a couple of years later, I have touch feeling but it has since been insensitive to heat and cold.

Find a shop with a scan tool that can capture snap shots while it is happening..........................just like Cat VIMS can and go from there. Even if you have to go to a truck shop and get a tech to hook up to it with Cummins Insight program. What are the fuel supply and rail pressures doing when it starts popping? Does it have an exhaust brake?

I always knew that................. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qztuEucrNBc

Any quality parts jobbers should have bulk cables and crimp ends and heat shrink. Just have them crimp the cable together with the heat shrink on the cable then take it home and add solder into the crimped cable ends and then finish by sealing the heat shrink yourself. If the cable end is the only thing that is bad just cut it off and crimp a new end on your cable, it would save you about $390.

Just ditch the FSS and go with a manual shut down cable.

You do not own a home but do own a pickup with a 5er trailer which is more than capable of traveling to other areas of the country for work, what is holding you back, you have no family yet and everything to gain? Most trade schools now offer paid on the job internships with many different companies that guarantee 100% placement after graduation, here in ND a lot of the skilled trades are hiring student inters and then have a full time employee after they graduate. Second If you think your brother pssd his career potential away because he started a family you have just lost all of my respect in one sentence, my wife and I can't have children, I would have traded my career for a family in a heart beat.

Why is everything so oily up on the back firewall like that, I would go nuts if there was any oil at all in my engine compartment like that, YIKES! In a coal mining environment oil coated wires like that is an immediate safety shutdown item and if MSHA saw it in use would be a very big fine for "failure to maintain". Just trace the wiring to whatever added components there are. That is a common fuse holder used for aftermarket add on accessories. Fuses melt like that because it was too big of a fuse for the load and they will melt or slow blow indicating too high of a draw for the circuit for whatever reason not knowing what it is for. On many occasions I have seen the old glass fuses melt the solder out of the end caps and if you didn't look close enough or use a meter you couldn't tell they were blown, the new style just melts the plastic indicating too big of a fuse in a flawed circuit.

The sedentary lifestyle that modern times have allowed people to fall into has been the primary reason for the bloated liberal take over of this country. The Why get off my arse if the gov will take care of my needs attitude has killed us, if I can't get a job with benefits I won't work rather than being creative. What is the advantage of trying when you see stories every single week of local law enforcement shutting down kids lemonade and cookie stands and making it impossible for youngsters who might have a drive to want to start a business. We are on a downhill slide as a country because of our business laws and the lack of Entrepreneurs wanting to work through the red tape when you can work your 40 hours a week for someone else and get cushy benefits and then cry and whine about everything as they collect benefits worth nearly 40-50% of their wages to boot. With parents that don't do anything now how else are the kids going to live with this example in front of them.

Your ears go numb in that kind of cold so someone could flick all they want and you wouldn't even notice it.

When I was a kid in school and got in trouble in the 70's and 80's the teachers were not afraid to let you have it in a physical way. Ruler to the back of the head was a warning, a yard stick swung like a baseball bat to the back of the head meant business. That was if they didn't just grab you by the ear or hair on the back of your neck and pick you up off the ground and carry you to the principals office that way. This was just the warm up for if your parents found out it got much worse if the news of bad behavior made it home before the bus. I remember laughing at my mom after a spanking with a wooden paddle that broke on my back side, she told my father who then brought out a foot long piece of 3/8 fuel hose for the lickins after that......................Those hurt like hell and left marks for a week and the laughing stopped after a couple of those whoopins. When I got older like in high school then it was an unsuspecting size 15 triple E redwing boot hooked to the end of the leg of a 6'3" 280 Lb man to my rear end from my father.

My wife and I dated for 2.5 years and were then engaged for another 2.5 years before getting married 15 years ago. Was 20 years ago this week we met. We dated and were engaged longer than most marriages last anymore these days.

lol..... well nothing is set in concrete yet. In reality it would probably be a few years before we leave Good ol ND.

Why throw away a perfectly good track bar on a 3rd gen when all you need to make it better than new are 20 dollar polyurethane bushings.

I prefer eliminating the issue by replacing it with a 3rd gen track bar conversion rather than replacing the end link with one that needs to be adjusted and can wear out just like the factory one if not kept up on. I have a friend that did lukes links and ruined a couple of them by not keeping up on the adjustments.

Max out the caster cams, you can not get enough caster on these rigs, maxing them out will get you in the 4-4.5* range which will help it track straighter overall too.