Doubletrouble

I can't speak to O'riley's but I used to be a loyal autozone customer. I have noticed in the past several years their quality has dropped dramatically. Their "lifetime" parts are cheap Chinese made garbage which allows them to keep handing you a new replacement every year or two. I have a local Napa store near me and I have to say the quality of the parts there is much better than AZ. I will pay a bit more to save on doing the labor involved all over again. In general though, replacement part quality I believe has suffered everywhere to some degree or another. Just my $.02

Is there also a friction modifier that needs to be added to the diff oil? This is something I need to do this year as well.

So either the adrenaline installed the issue stopped or was it the repair on the map sensor plug?.....or, is it still doing the same thing?

Definitely do the crank case breather mod. (I believe there is an article on that as well). That cleaned up the front on my engine, also helps to keep my new radiator from getting all oily.

This is the carnage from my nv4500 after having the oem oil in it for I assume 187k miles. I bought the truck used so I don't know for sure if it had ever been changed. I rebuilt the trans myself and on @Mopar1973Man's advice I now use the sae 50w in the trans.

The atf is for the transfer case

I like @Mopar1973Manput 50 SAE trans oil in my 5 speed after a recent rebuild. So far I'm happy with it. I do notice it being a bit thick on cold morningmore start the engine (clutch in) and let her run til the oil pressure builds the release the clutch and let the oil in the trans circulate a minute before I take off. It don't take long to notice the oil in the trans has warmed a bit.

I don't completely disagree agree with you @Tractorman, the oem injectors will run a long time. To a person that owns one for a long period of time the change would be minute. The big issue long term is that if an old injector were to fail in a worse fashion it would suddenly dump fuel like mad into a cylinder and wash it out scarring the walls and wiping out the rings. Now there is a rebuild needed. Alot of what we do is preventative maintenance. These engines will last a very long time if cored for and the warning signs taken seriously. Not saying that this scenario will be on every injector at a given milage but it does happen. The prevention is worth the expense. Back to the OP's original issue. I see that he has an H.O. vp44 pump. Could that have an impact on the timing changing as he states? @Mopar1973Man may be able to answer that, myself I don't know for sure. Just a thought.

Thanks @Mopar1973Man, I couldn't have explained it that well.

@Tractorman, I don't feel signed out at all. All opinions are welcome here. Just trying to help a fellow 2nd gen owner out. @Mopar1973Man may be able to explain the relation of idle to weak injectors better than I can. My theory is this: the injectors fire when the pump pressure overrides the spring of the injector. Springs get weak over time, I think we can all agree on that. With as many cycles as these springs see in a lifetime there is no doubt they will loose some tension which in turn changes the timing of the injection event. Weak springs will fire sooner (advance) over time. Also, the internal needle and seat inside the tip will also wear and not seal as well as when new. They will begin to leak. I've driven large diesel trucks for many years. Injectors do wear out, go bad and cause issues. When I changed my injectors I went with 100hp from DAP, I noticed immediately that it would start up a bit faster in the colder weather, when it was warm out even quicker. That has just been my experience.

Being the idle is above 800 and the load is at 0% your injectors may be weak. If you don't trust that scanner can you borrow one from somewhere? Just to get you an accurate reading. When my injectors were bad my truck idled at around the same as yours and showed 0% load at idle. I believe they were the oem injectors with 150k+ on them. Generally that don't last much past 100-120k miles.

With your scanner hooked up look at the engine idle speed and the percent of.load at idle. That will give a clue to the health of the injectors. Engine should idle at 800rpm and load should be roughly 5%. If there is no load at idle and the idle fluctuates it indicates the injector pop pressure is low. There is also a possibility it could be something in the ecm.

The keys are selected when the pump is being tested and calibrated. They are a specific size to obtain the proper timing for that particular pump.

I won't claim to know alot when it comes to a vp44 install, I have yet to do one myself. I do know that if you don't use the key the new pump comes with it can mess with things. I don't know if the pump will compensate for something being "off".

Mainly watching for engine load change for no reason. On flat ground, cruise set the engine load shouldn't change a whole lot. If it is then something may be causing the timing to fluctuate for no reason. Engine load is what would cause the computer to change timing.

And the quadzilla zillaraider you have there, honestly that's the first I've heard of one. Not saying they're good or bad, I've only heard of the quad adrenaline and the xzt. @dieselautopower may be able to help with that when needed.

@daav544, before we go putting another tuner on her how about we try to sort the problem first. Since you did the ground mod have you checked for a/c noise? There is an article explaining how to do so. You said you have 50hp injectors so she should run fine with no tuner. I run 100hp sticks on stock tune no problem. Do you have a scanner? One that will give you live data? If so, you could try driving down the road at a steady speed to recreate the issue and take note of engine load, if your on flat ground, climbing a grade and so on. If you hit a small hill obviously the engine load will change. If this is happening on flat ground for no reason then we need to figure out why timing is changing when not needed. You also stated that it has a new H.O. vp44 pump. Who installed the pump? There could be something there. Maybe wrong key when installed? Someone with more vp44 install experience can chime in on that part. Just thinking it through trying to help.

Nice truck!

The large wire on the bottom of the alternator is the charge lead, that should go to your 150a breaker or fuse then to the passenger side battery. The wire from the fuse panel to the alternator is tour field lead. That goes back into the loom going across the front of the engine. No cutting for that one

I believe the ratio for the 2 cycle oil to fuel is 1oz oil per gallon of fuel. That's what I've been doing for a couple years now. Also, did the map sensor connections clean up good? You stated that it had green corrosion in the plug. You may want to replace the plug or sensor to be sure of a good connection. The w-t mode shouldn't take more than a couple hours under the hood and we'll worth the effort. Read the w-t ground mod simplified article by @Mopar1973Man, it gives you the meat and potatoes of the process.

Back to the w-t mid for a sec, there is a good write or two on how to do it in the articles section. I to want a quad adrenaline someday, I'm in the same boat, the money just isn't available right now but it is definitely on my list of must haves in the future.

I don't know if the a/c noise is the issue here but I can't stress enough (I'm sure @Mopar1973Man agrees) how important the w-t ground mod is to these trucks. Both manual trans and automatics benifit. More so the automatics I believe. Just my $.02

Looks better! Is the primer you used an etching primer for bare metal? Just curious. I need to do some of the same to my truck. My trouble spots are the rockers, bottoms of the doors and cab corners.

Wow that stands out! If you miss that your blind

@hayman75, are the new cable a larger gauge? The look pretty big. Set up looks good though, I like the military style battery terminals. I'll most likely reuse my cables, they're in decent shape. Thanks for the pic. @rejracer, sorry you had such bad luck with alternators. I've never heard of someone going through so many in that amount of time. Wow