ISX

Welcome to the forum. Always nice to see another 12ver

Never heard of that forum but checked it out and learned a few things I am gonna do now. I can't believe how many forums there are for these trucks. Welcome to this forum.

Here is how to find absolute TDC that you must know in order to set your timing or stuff like that that needs to be tedious. You will need the cummins barring tool. It is not absolutely necessary but it does make it a lot easier as you will need to be barring then engine over very slowly. You will also need a dial indicator, doesn't have to be insanely fancy. Now the actual steps. [*]Bar the engine over until you are at TDC compression/power #1. To do this, you watch the valves on #6 and stop when they overlap. If you are going clockwise the exhaust will shut and the intake will open, when that intake moves that is when you stop. If you are barring it counterclockwise (alternator cranks this way) you would watch the intake close and stop when the exhaust starts to open. [*]Bar the engine backwards a little bit, maybe 2-3" going by the top of the damper, or at least 25* rotation, remember that this is backwards so it would be counterclockwise rotation. [*]You should now be at 25* or so before TDC. Put the dial indicator on the top of the valve and loosen the adjustment nut on the pushrod and measure about 0.150 down from where the rocker contacts the valve. DO NOT FORCE IT! It should turn easily all the way to that point, otherwise you may be hitting the piston and must not have cranked the engine back far enough. [*]Now turn the engine very slowly clockwise so that the piston will start coming up and hit the valve. You must go slow because you only want it to hit it and deflect the gauge about 0.002". So if you zero'ed it out at 0.150", you would want it to drop to 0.148" and stop. [*]At this point, mark the damper any way you want at any point of accurate reference that you want. I used tape to denote the edge of the speed sensor. If your damper is oily, clean the oil off so the tape/marker/dog hair/whatever you use to mark it will not be rubbed off. [*]Now, without touching the dial indicator (needs to stay in that exact spot and measurement) back the valve lash back off until it is just contacting the valve, or looser. It must be retracted or the piston will hit. [*]Rotate the engine clockwise about 3-4" or 35* so we know we are a good way past TDC. [*]Set the valve lash to the same 0.150". [*]Rotate the engine counterclockwise slowly until it hits the valve and deflects the dial indicator the same 0.002" (will read as 0.148"). Make another mark at this point. [*]Now back the lash back off, set it back to the stock lash setting (0.010" Intake/0.020" Exhaust) as now is just as good of time as any to set it back since it is on TDC compression/power, you will be on the inner base circle of the cam. [*]Now you take those 2 marks, measure them with calipers or something accurate though a tape measure will do if you have good eyes. You will probably get something between 1" and 1.5". [*]Divide that measurement by 2 and measure from one of your marks towards the other mark (which should be the center of those 2 marks), make a mark at this point. This mark is absolute TDC, so if you want to not have to do this every time, I suggest you make this mark permanent by various means. Some tips: [*]The permanent mark can be made with a steel cutting saw blade, cutting a 1/16"-1/8" deep slit into the damper. [*]You can use a mill to machine a mark into it. [*]The edge of a file may work as well. [*]If you think your going to move the dial indicator for some reason, you can zero the dial indicator right at the point where the valve contacts the rocker, then you can do whatever you want and just reference that point each time, going 0.150" from there. [*]Do NOT forget to back the lash off after making your mark or you risk forgetting and cranking the engine into the valve and doing damage. I can't stress this enough, take your time and read each step carefully. http-~~-//www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8YWQs_QMAU

Added PDC (Power Distribution Box) to it. The "Fuse Box" is the thing on the side of the dash. The red colors denote another PDC connection somewhere in the listings, meaning don't look for a wire outside of that box because it connects to something else inside it. The blue one means it is not in the PDC, that wire has a million splices so I just picked an easy one for the "One End" cell. A colon ":" denotes everything connecting within that. So if it says PDC: Blower Motor/Headlights/Tailights/Oil Slick, it means they are all inside the PDC. That one was actually a complete PITA (3 hours to do) and I know half those wires aren't in my truck but I will just have to see what I actually have. I looked at every single page and noted every single connection so everything should be accounted for.I also sorted both of them by wire color, so Black is first and Yellow is last..I did it on both of them so I had to reupload the sorted version of the PCM wiring.

They talk about oil here, might help you out a bit.

This should work from 1994-1997, not sure about 1998, probably close enough for that one. Basically I needed to trace out every single PCM wire and after 2 hours I got it all written down. If there is a "/", that means it splices into something else as well, hopefully the things that say a/c doesn't throw anyone off . The PCM has 3 big connectors, I am calling them A, B, and C, just like the schematic does. I haven't went out and looked to see which is which but they are color coded (White/Grey/Black). On a more subtle note, if you want to know how your truck is really wired, trace each one yourself I might make a few more of these. It's kinda nice knowing how many or what wires go into the PCM or PDC (power distribution box(the black one on the drivers side fender)) without having to trace them out for an hour. The numbers (PCM-A1 or the like) all correlate with the master wiring diagram which can be downloaded here. 1997 PCM Wiring.pdf 1997 PDC Wiring.pdf

What are the chances of all that happening and you getting sued? All of the people with utility beds on their trucks are overloaded. My brothers 6.0 powerscope weighs in at 13,000 with all the crap in that bed. His is a SRW as well, still an F350 but still, it's gotta be way over, he does have air bags on it.

Oh now I see. As in a camper in the bed. Had to read it a few more times. Yes, now I see why you want air bags and stuff. You would be overloaded in that instance.

Yes it is just the truck and the tongue weight of the trailer. So if you wanted to find out you would hook the truck to the trailer and weight it leaving the trailer hanging off the scale. That would make it 8800-Truck+Tongue Weight=GVWR. Basically a dakota is what is rated to pull that thing.. Your good to go, with lots of room to grow, so pull the boat behind the camper :thumb1:Payload means GVWR (8800) - Vehicle Weight (6545) = 2255 (or 2380). That is how much weight you can add to the truck. If you want to get more detailed there are ratings per axle. So if your truck was like it is now, you could put a tongue weight of 2255 on the truck and be fine, though that would be wayyy more tongue weight than you would ever want and would have to be a 5th wheel. Like I said, the OEM hitch on the bumper is only rated for 1000lbs tongue weight.

I'm going to say you can get away with up to 3-5k lbs without trailer brakes. After that you pretty well must have them. It is not about the engine pulling it or not, it is about can you stop if something should happen. There are people on here pulling 10-15k lb trailers around no problem that also use proper braking. I would say any sane person can pull up to 15k with said trailer brakes. I wouldn't pull anything heavier than 20-25k. There comes a point where you just need to get something better for the job at hand. Having experience is the biggest thing. There are people on the road with duallys who shouldn't be given the right to pull a jet ski trailer. Like the people with 30ft enclosed trailers doing 80 on the interstate. There are many circumstances to it all which will effect the max weight you should pull. I rode with a guy with a dodge V10 and we pulled a 50ft gooseneck heaping with I beams that was 50k lbs. Not a problem doing that if you want to kill your trans and potentially kill everything else, but stopping is the problem. We only had to go a mile down the road and we never broke 25mph. Not sure it could go any faster than that as it was to the floor the whole time but, it is just logic. If your gonna pull a big load like that, logic tells you that you better take it easy. Ok I posted this with you only having 5 words done at first lol. To answer the rest of your post, GVWR means just the truck. So A truck with 100lbs of tongue weight for the trailer means your at 6645 (if it weighs 100lbs). The OEM hitch seems to be 1000lbs tongue weight/10,000lb trailer. That means you can max the hitch out and still be under 8800 lbs GVWR. This might help you out as well. http://dodgeram.info/2001/towing-charts.html

Just thought of another big thing that you can stem off of. Gassers hardly ever come with an engine oil cooler OEM. I think anyways, don't mess with them too much. But you could explain why it is that they don't have them and why diesels have them.

Energy Content DifferencesMPG DifferencesFuel cold weather differencesEngine block differences (diesel is heavier/stronger)Engine RPM Differences (Gasser revs a lot higher)Both have similar cooling systemsBoth have similar lubrication systemsBoth can use the same trans (if power is the same, V10/Cummins used NV4500HD)Both have similar electrical systems (cept for addition of grid heater)Both rely on compression to be efficientHmmmmm

I haven't been paying attention to diesel since I have been driving a gasser while I play with mine. I did happen to realize it all today. I looked at all the prices and holy hell, $3.70 for diesel. It was $3.00 last time I looked, maybe a month ago. Didn't realize it was rising that fast.

Made a chart this morning, not what I wanted but don't have time to make what I really wanted to do (will try tonight). I still need to edit and upload the video of how to find true TDC. Once I found it on mine I actually took it to the mill and made a mark. The end mill is only 1/8" wide and the cut is only about 1/16" deep so it shouldn't mess with the RPM sensor. Basically the center of the cut is TDC when lined up with the edge of the RPM sensor.

Today I set the valves to stock 10/20 so it wouldn't be my weird 8/15 setting. The previous readings are right as well. I forgot I couldn't do lift because my dial indicator is only 1/4" and although I could have just reindexed it a bunch of times, I didn't want to lol. Readings are not too different, valve overlap is. I will try and get something up tomorrow, have some other things to get done tonight.

Am I missing out on something? The only new game I have played is grand theft auto for a week when I was sick, I bought a PS2 and that game then took it back when I got better Looked up every cheat code and just went straight to the golf cart with the golf club and rolled the cart a million times and beat another million people with the 9 iron. I didn't have much fun if I was driving anything else or had any other weapon

In an hour or 3 I am going to redo it to make sure. I kinda used a crappy sharpy to label what was what and after I took the damper off I noticed I was writing on top of oil. I could tell what everything was for the most part. The measurements are accurate I just don't know about which thing was which but everything is still out there and marks are still there so I am going to do it again after I clean that damper completely off so that I will be able to tell for sure. 99.9% sure it is right though. I will get a lift measurement (at the current 8 intake/15 exhaust) and then I will set the valves to 10/20 since that is what it's supposed to be and I will redo everything again and get numbers for that.Wild and Free, that is a great idea. I did all of that stuff just by rough calculation, now I can do it dead nuts. I also want to get a chart or something going that is a lot better looking than a big paragraph, ran out of time though.

I put a dial indicator on top of my valves, did some fancy work to find exact TDC (have movie, need to edit), and found when the valves opened/peaked/closed and marked them all on the damper. I did some fancy calculations and came up with my numbers on what happens as the engine turns.I will start at the power stroke, the diesel blows up and the piston goes down, 60* before the piston hits the bottom of the power stroke, the exhaust is already opening. The piston then goes up on the actual exhaust stroke with the exhaust valve peaking at 113* before the piston reaches TDC on the exhaust stroke. At 12* BTDC Exhaust stroke, the intake valve starts opening. At 12* past TDC on the intake stroke, the exhaust valve is closed. 91* into the intake stroke, the intake valve peaks. The piston continues down then starts back up on the compression stroke. 13* into the compression stroke, the intake valve is closed. Exhaust Valve total duration is 252*Intake Valve total duration is 206*Valve Overlap is 24*Everything is in crankshaft degrees, NOT camshaft degrees. Camshaft degrees would be half of what I just wrote since it moves half the speed. So 180* rotation on the crank is only 90 on the cam.This was with my valves at 0.008" Intake and 0.015" Exhaust.

It weighs at least 1000. I thought I missed a bolt with mine because the cherry picker was straining so much, the whole truck was coming way up and I said damn I missed one. Nope, engine just weighs the truck down that much lol. It finally started lifting out, might use the front end loader next time.

Did you do it like I said or find another route? Curious if it worked as good for you as it did for me.

I never even thought of that. I have some of this high temp high pressure fancy grease that I use on everything. It holds up to the heat of the injector holes as I rub them down with it. Would think anything along those qualities would work just as well on those parts too.

Some taps are within just a few thousandths between metric and standard so if you matched them up they will be basically the same. I am not sure if 1/8" NPT would be the same as 12x1.75, guessing not because 12mm is nearly 1/2" which is considerably larger than the 0.343" drill you use for 1/8" NPT. Either way it still wouldn't work because NPT is tapered so that the threads on the probe will tighten down once it gets far enough on the taper, otherwise it would just bottom out. If you still think it will work, the drill for your metric tap is 13/32". I was wrong on the Q drill bit, there is a lot of blown around info on the net. Here's the right guide. http://www.physics.ncsu.edu/pearl/Tap_Drill_Chart.html

Should be 1/8" NPT which uses a R drill bit or 11/32 would be closest.

Next time let me know what you want to do and I can order the extension, solder everything up and ship it to you. Just pay for the extension and I'll cover the rest. Anything you need like that..you pay parts to my house, I do it and pay shipping to yours, then it costs you the same as if it just went to your house. I might be able to compare to you though. Had to solder in 20 gauge wire into 15 pins of a tiny connector, connector in one hand, iron in the other, feeding solder with my mouth Ok maybe it doesn't compare, but I did that for 20 hours over 2 days haha. But yeah next time, let me know! It would be my honor to do anything like that for you.

An amp gauge for the trailer brakes, now that would be neat! Have to try that out.