2006 5.9L 2500 - Check Gauges Warning Light, Voltage Drop on Dash

[Tomassend]

Being a new Dodge owner (past 3 months) I have never been more impressed with the rig. I have used a lot of machinery in my days, but this thing is quite impressive. However on Monday I noticed the check gauges warning light came on during heavy towing, immediately I shifted to the the following checks checks and corresponding results as I was driving:- Oil Pressure Gauge: Holding Pressure- Engine Temperature: Steady 200 degrees, Good- Edge Computer EGT: 900 degrees, Good- Edge Computer Coolant Temp (ECT): 850 degrees, Good- Battery Voltage Gauge (Dash): 12V while driving and engine running...............UH OH!The Battery volts normally exceeds 14 V when the engine is running, so all of a sudden I assumed there was a power loss, maybe alternator??? Either way, I finished the towing I needed to and took the truck home and parked it. It was 11 PM, deal with it in the morning, battery showed 12 V when parked.The next morning going out to my truck I had the assumption that my alternator had potentially gone out and that my truck would probably start. Going to the truck, I tried to start it and the batteries were smoked. How could this be? We are definitely looking at something more than an alternator now.........yikes. But, whatever I am looking at now somehow drained the battery overnight while it was not running; just sucking juice.I had enough battery life to run the Edge Tuner and pulled the codes out of the diagnostics application. The following codes were displayed on my Edge Tuner:P2609P2509P2503P2502Checking all the ground connections for cracks in wires, looking at battery terminals for corrosion, and the like where first checks I performed. Everything here came out clean, nothing crazy caught my attention and I scoured over everything pretty tight. Again, what's draining the battery??!?!??Doing more homework I came to the understanding that (at times) the grid heaters can become stuck on and suck so much amps and voltage that it zaps the battery, even when the truck is turned off. Now before going any further, Michael from M1973M totally acted as a great sounding board and helped me with the diagnostics. The truck is new to me, so diving into this was a little intimidating at first; but I owe all of the progress to Michael, thanks again for helping me through this.With the new established confidence I headed out and looked under the hood again. Stepping back to a more understanding mindset, I looked and saw two wire terminal connectors on the passenger side of the truck on the positive battery terminal. One wire went directly to the alternator, the other hit the a sort of solenoid/relay. This relay was for the grid heaters, the unit which controls power to the heaters and turns them on and off. If this burns out, then the heaters are stuck on and stay heated. Since the truck batteries were dead, I disconnected all the batter terminals, pulled the batteries, pulled the alternator (cause I was going to napa for a surge charge anyways), grabbed the fuseable link wire from relay to batter, and headed to the parts shop. Alternator tested fine, fuseable link tested fine (ohm meter, no resistance which is want you want), and charged the batts up.Returning home, I reassembled everything, with the exception of the fusable link to the solenoid for the gridheaters, and fired up the truck. You can start the truck without the grid heaters up until about 30 degrees without any harm per M1973m, so I was definitely comfortable doing so. Looking at the battery gauge, it jumped right back up to where it should be, upwards of 15 Volts where I normally see it.....good to go, for now.Where am I at with all this, the truck runs, the battery's are being charged, and things look good. Went to the truck this morning, turned the auxillary on, battery gauge is good, truck started. I have the solenoid being delivered to the stealer (dealer) today and should have it installed without issue. One thing I should mention is no where in this process has the check engine light come on. HOWEVER, once I ran the truck without the fusable link, the light has come on but no new codes have come up on the diagnostic test.The check engine light is probably on because the solenoid is not connected. I have a good feeling once I reconnect the entire system, it should go away. I will let you all know.Hope this helps, happy Dodging.Dave

[Rogan]

Edge coolant temp 850*???Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk 2

[AH64ID]

P2509-POWERDOWN DATA LOST ERRORP2503-CHARGING SYSTEM OUTPUT LOWP2502-CHARGING SYSTEM ERRORP2609-NO VOLTAGE DROP SEEN FROMINTAKE AIR HEATERSThe grid relay can fail on, but generally fail off. Don't worry about starting the truck without it, removing it is very common and Cummins rates the engine to start down to 10° without any aid (including grid heater). If it happens again with the link installed I would touch (carefully) the grid heater and see if it's hot. Or use your voltmeter and check for voltage. Another common problem is the wire that connects the 2 batteries can become loose and/or faulty. The ECM connects to the drivers battery and the alternator to the passenger battery. It's possible your connections were loose and removing and reinstalling the batteries fixed this issue. I would pull your newest code and see where you are at.

[Tomassend]

Rogan - 850......don't quote me on that. I think that was a typo on my part, sorry for that. I just tried to remember and 850 came up.......newbie with a diesel, lol.AH64ID - I just caught wind in the performance forum that you blew the baffles out of your intake hose.....I just followed suit on that this afternoon. I did it about 10 minutes after Dorkweed mentioned it to me as I am on my way to tuning up the exhaust and intake zone of the truck.I replaced the solenoid this afternoon, it's just held by a couple torx bit screws and mounted to the side of the airbox. I started the truck and the volts climbed on the dash, no check gauges, no check engine.I definitely see where you are coming from with the battery cable thing. When removing it the thing was mega tight, so unfortunately it was not the issue. I spend a lot of time driving on the weekends with the camper, so the security of having the solenoid replaced was worth it. I will clear the codes on the Edge CTS and then re-run to see if I pick up anymore, fingers crossed.Thanks for your replies, great to meet you all as well.Dave

[AH64ID]

Hopefully it's fixed!I didn't remove the baffles from my intake, I don't think it's worth it to just remove them. The part you can remove does nothing to hinder flow. I used an Airaid MIT, a much better way to improve flow to the turbo. There are also the directional vanes in the lower 90° elbow, you want to leave those there.

[Tomassend]

Reset the Edge CTS codes and then ran the diagnostics, no codes. Looks like that did it, sweetness.Baffles - That wasn't you? Oh well, I removed them anyways. It was super simple and even though there aren't any real gains but heard you can hear the turbo more. I figured it was like blowing the baffles out of a motorcycle pipe or something. It's good to just take things apart and get more comfortable with digging in the truck as a whole.I will get the Airaid MIT for sure. I did see the directional vanes and figured not to fiddle.