just bought my first diesel. ive always been a chevy guy so i am new to dodges. i bought a 95 12 valve with a manual transmission. its in perfect shape inside and out and everything is stock and im interested in doing some major upgrades. my limit is $10,000... i am going all out. but i still want it to be something i can drive on a regular basis. i am very savvy with cars, but unfamiliar with deisels. any suggestions on particular brands of aftermarket turbos and other parts i should look into?

 

With 10 grand I'll give you a list in order what you should do if you plan to do it all at once and efficiently. A clutch, likely dual disk 3250 style from sbc or valair, hd hydraulics which both companies make and you want the kit with the flywheel and the larger input shaft. Aswell as the fifth gear fix. There is a company that makes a good one out there I believe if you google 5 gear repair they are an independent transmission company and make a good product for around 100 bucks. That puts you at 2000 for clutch and what not. Next is a lift pump, airdog or fass, pick your poison. Fass seems to have a better reputation for reliability. A 150gph or so is the size you want. Don't go smaller. That's about 600 or so.air dogs come with the 1/2 fuel line upgrade I'm sure fass does aswell. You will need gauges, boost, egt and a fuel pressure since it's stick and you don't gotta worry about the trans. I'd then immediately pull the head get a valve job, port and polish and depending how far you wanna go there's other things you can do. You can oring or fire ring if you want but stock cummins hg with studs can handle 80 psi if done correct. Get studs, many options. I personally went expensive with arp 625 custom age plus for insurance. Next is afc mods, grind the fuel plate, and learn how to tune the thing. That you can do before any other work to get familiar. Those simple mods alone are enough to make 2-250 wheel horse. Also do a governer spring kit. Either a 3 or 4000rpm one. The 4000 is a little touchy with standard but drivable if your good at driving stick. You will need valve springs 60lb from any well known company. Or 150's from industrial injection. Do that when the heads off. You can get delivery valves, 191's are popular but there are many different styles. Stay away from full or laser cuts as they are very smokey and hot, those will change your tuning and you will need to adjust the afc. Pump timing can be done and can yield lots of power. Depending on your climate you can run around 22 degrees all year round but make sure you have studs or say bye to the hg. Next is injectors, depending on your goals 5x12 or 5x14 will get you between 350-700 horse. You can spend the money on intake piping from crazy carls, installed the full 3.5 intercooler piping and 3.5 big intake horn on a buddies truck. Very nice units. Do not and I mean absolutely do not waste money on a cold air intake. Total waste. Just get a bhaf or an afe bhaf which flows a bit better. Run stock air box tube and all that. Cold airs do basically nothing. Next you can get a ex manifold if you want. Many companies make 3 pieces which are good with egt and drive pressure ports. All basically the same design just vary in price a bit, if you have the money and want a very nice unit steed speed makes a very nice cnc one piece that claims to be the best of the best. Finally turbo, since your likely gonna keep it pretty simple a bd special or bd killer bee will get you everything you need in a nice quality package, comes wastegated and a hx40 down pipe and all hardware to install included in the very reasonable price. There are many turbo companies but really unless your looking for something specific one of the bd's will be perfect for you. My best friends truck which I built made 405 on less than half of what I mentioned and a bd special, basically stock truck, now with injectors, dv's, electric fans and a billet race trans it's likely around 500hp and that's a mostly stock truck, stock timing, stock hg and stock lift pump. And there ya go. A 350-600 ish horse recipe.