CSM

Nobody is building anything. All the raw material commodities are down. IMO, buckle up boys. Stuff is gonna get cheap! I am hoping land prices drop like a brick from heaven. More than just the 70s stuff. Everything got crushed during cash for clunkers. A few short SHORT years ago, like 10 years, I was able to get parts for stuff and find neat stuff dating to the 40s and occasionally 20s in the yards in CO. Now? The yards are closed except for the big ones. The old ones crushed everything under state "beautification" pressure and the opportunity to actually make a few bucks on their pile of steel. There were two all original 49 Buick Straight 8 2 doors parked in a yard near where I grew up. They didn't run, but they were complete and original. They hadn't moved for about 30 years as they were buried in the back of the yard. They needed a front end loader and some $100 bills to the yard hands to get to them that I didn't have at the time. Flat.

If you find any classic old car parts up there, talk to me before you send it to the crusher!

I know! Nice change from the normal.

I agree with Jag1. It really could be nice to have an inspection port above the tank, however it is really easy to drop the tank. I used two rachet straps looped around the frame and just cranked the mostly empty tank up and down. When it is empty it doesn't weigh hardly anything. If I had a friend I could have done it with my big floor jack on one end and a friend bench pressing the other end up for the minute it took to get the factory mounting strap around the tank. I also agree with getting rid of the intank screens. New, they work fine but most are plugged up with crap at this point and unless you are going to completely clean everything and painstakingly wash out the plastic screens they aren't worth much.

The closed roads drive me nuts. It isn't nearly as good as it was in the early 900 or 80s with old roads everywhere.

My personal technique is to accidentally the whole thing while removing it and buy a new radiator.

You guys in the NW with access to lots of timber have it nice... We really have to work for it in parts of Colorado. The government doesn't want us to use up all the wood they save for the annual forest fires.

What do you use to heat your snow cave (shop) on Hoth?

The commercial hangars and shops I've been in were decently insulated or at least semi air tight and had the overhead black steel radiant flame heaters above the front of the bays and some big fans in the ceiling if it was a really high structure. My dad is looking at doing the same, but his isn't near air tight yet.

My OEM alternator in my 2002 Cummins Auto was producing high AC voltage occasionally during very hot days and was causing my transmission to shift improperly (see Torque Converter Lock Unlock Issues). Many of us have had this problem and have tried many different remanufactured alternators to varying degrees of success. As noted in the torque converter article, AC noise is going to come from the diodes in the rectifier failing or failed solder joints in the alternator. Heat and load is generally the cause of electrical component failure. The heat can kill the diodes themselves and also damage the solder joints on the circuit boards. Heat can come from high power loads on the alternator like extended use of heater grids, high wattage aftermarket inverters or accessories, and also normal use during extremely hot weather. Load can be normal electrical loads, but load can be unintentionally increased by deteriorating grounding or poor electrical connections. It isn’t uncommon to see cables and corrosion on our old trucks and grounding alone can cause high intermittent resistance that can burn out electronics. (Note: all of my tests were done with a Fluke 115 multimeter.) From Mopar Man's article, we know we should not see more than 0.1 VAC from the alternator. Ideally, VAC should be as low as possible. Some noise is impossible to eliminate, but there should not be much. My original alternator voltage was 1.3 VAC max at higher RPM and 0.040 VAC max at idle. Occasionally on really hot days, the truck would really act up and I am convinced that it was higher than this, but this is the highest I registered as I didn’t have the meter on it all the time. Needless to say, I needed a new alternator. I decided to give Mechman a try. It was expensive, but I don't really have time to mess around as I am on the road and away from home for an extended period. Mechman is known for heavy duty high output alternators commonly used in very high output car audio systems as well as marine engines. They advertise some pretty amazing numbers on youtube, have impressive made in USA parts, hairpin stators and solid copper rectifier plates with up to 300% more heat transfer capability than stock. Mechman advertised the unit I purchased as being the same unit they sell for Cummins Marine applications and have yet to have one unit returned for overheating. Plus, the alternator is also supposed to be capable of putting out more power at idle than the OEM alternator at RPM. All sounds good, right? I also bought the zero gauge cable kit, to make certain that at least the alternator is grounded. More on the cable kit below. Final Results: Mechman Alternator was showing 0.025 VAC at idle and 0.051 VAC throughout the RPM range. Time will tell if this alternator keeps up, but overall I was impresed with how it runs. The transmission shifts far far better than it ever has, even with the VAC within limits. I did request a OEM sized pulle on the unt, which must have been overlooked by Mechman. I don't doubt they would fix this, but I have decided to give the smaller pulley a try. The kit, as delivered... And yes, I know the engine is a bit dirty. New cables and a wiring clean up is in the works. Front of the alternator, note the smaller than factory pulley. I am getting some squeaking on shutdown due to the pulley and will end up getting a new smaller belt soon. I will update if I find a good solution to this. Mechman does this to get more power at idle, and advertised more output at idle than the factory alternator at peak RPM. Rear of the alternator. Note the copper plate and copper output stud. A note about the stud, it doesn't fit the cable connectors included in the cable kit I bought, but the cable kit is easily drillable to the correct diameter and I found no problem with this minor "modification" required. Accessories in the Alternator box, not required for this installation. Cable kit, cable on left, connectors on the bottom, fuse zip ties and heat shrink on the right. Below is the cable and fuse. It is a simple system. I used the zip ties to keep a little tension on the cable as I fed it into the connector. You cut and install the connectors yourself. It wasn't that difficult, just remember to measure twice and cut once. I still have enough black cable to make some additoinal grounds for the truck and I only used 4 connectors. I ordered the 170 Amp alternator that isn't advertised on their site. You can call Mechman and ask for special stuff, and in this case, 170A is more than I need and cost less than their 260A model. Mechman also runs a slightly smaller pulley to get more RPM from the alternator. I was able to run the OEM sized accessory belt on my truck after the swap. However, I do think that I will need to find a slightly smaller sized belt eventually as the OEM sized belt squeaks a little when I kill the engine. I opted for Mechman's 1/0 Zero Gauge cable kit. This kit is overkill. I love overkill when it comes to key systems like primary electrical and fuel system. These cables could carry a lot more power than my 170A alternator can put out. Chances are you could make your own kit for less money from a welding supply shop or good auto parts shop. The kit included two lengths of cable, some really great adhesive backed heat shrink, connectors, and a decent 170 A fuse. The idea here is to eliminate the resistance between the ground, battery, and the alternator. Resistance causes heat, and the less heat I have the better and longer this system should work. The factory small gauge wiring is suitable for OEM loads and the battery lead (positive lead from alternator to battery) should still be enough... But the OEM ground is inadequate in my opinion even for OEM alternators. Here is the OEM lead to the fuse block & battery. Puny steel connectors running from alternator field to fuse block to battery. Mechman leads, which bypass the fuse block with a separate fuse straight into the battery... When this system is ran this way, it bypasses the 140A factory fuse, below in red. I disconnected the fuse and kept the fuse just in case I need the factory wiring, which I kept zip tied out of the way. Removing this fuse de-energized the OEM field wire. This post also makes a nice in junction box 12V unfused battery tap that I plan on using when I clean up my wiring and replace the battery cables. All in all, easy install, good parts, and hopefully... Peace of mind. If the alternator fails or I have any trouble with it I will update the article. Sofar so good, one month in as of 1/16. View full Cummins article

How much faster did the twins spool off idle compared to the single? I am thinking of off reducing off the line smoke without driving like grandpa.

How much lower did the twins get measurable boost compared to the lone 62/12?

I don't know anything about twins. I am assuming I would want one of the smaller ones. I want spool and smoke elimination while enhancing overall performance. I don't need more power or want to buy a smaller turbo, but I want fast spool for the altitude. I am interested though, especially if you would give me some tips on install.

I am not experienced either... But, from what I can recall of the theory, the idea is that you want the least turbine outlet temperature for the given amount of fuel. That should give you the most energy returned to the inlet side of the ic engine. In my experience playing with the TST interaction with the smarty, I really don't like the smarty on 1. I don't think it drives nearly as smooth as a smarty on 3/5. I am not sure that the smarty's timing family of curves are the same for 1 as they are for the higher numbers. Good luck, and I am looking for an S400 + piping to do what you've done... Although I kinda want to buy a new cam.

Need taller lifts. I am 6'2" as well and with the ones at the AF shop maxed out I can work standing up on 80% of the stuff. The differential is about neck height.

I love lifts.

God heats my car port.

Rattle will equal something akin to a Saturn V rocket if he has the association.

Nothing like abcesses. Bloody green streaked cottage cheese with a special aroma. My car truck and motorcycle never get abcesses.

Nice. I did the horse thing all through growing up. Rodeo'ed and all. After going to school/career I didn't have the time to devote to the horses. We had some great horses though, team penning was my favorite and really the only thing I was good at. We did have some real jerk horses as well though, and I still feel that John Wayne said it best, "horses are a bunch of trouble tied up in a big leather bag!" I pray that none of our kids ever want to do horses, though I did learn a lot from it.

On the rear attachment points of your control arms there are cams. They look like offset circles. They can be rotated to set the caster of the front axle. They are usually quite stiff as they haven't been adjusted in years. Some guys like as much caster as they can get. I haven't messed with mine, but will eventually.

I didn't know you did the horse thing.