Fellow Bombers,

I recently bought an 06 ram 2500 and need a little help. I'm new to the diesel world and currently am loving every moment of it. I've heard that there were some innate problems (not many) with the 06 cummins and the aftermarket provides some solutions for them.

Could anyone fill me in on (in plain english, I'm a newbie) on what these problems were and how I can solve them now? I know the cummins right now is almost bullet proof, I just want to ensure I don't experience any of these problems, prep my rig for the long haul and maybe add a little juice just for the fun of it.

A to do list, per say, in order from 1-? would help me out immensely. The list could start with the "needs" and end with the "wants" as I hinted to above. Thanks.


-Lucky13Sgt

 

Get yourself a good 2 micron fuel filter to help save your injectors. Then do your basics.... Gauges, Exhaust, Intake, Smarty or Smarty Jr.

Luke

 

Fuel filtration first, get as good a filter as possible between the OE cannister and the CP-3. # um is the best that is available at this time.

Youe exhaust is already 4" and unless your going for big power its good. A 5" tailpipe would deepen the tone a bit.

The 4" Fleetguard filter is the best air filter available for the stock box and is good to 500 HP or better. Either drill the air box with extra holes in the bottom or add a PVC pipe to the wheel well to stop the filter minder form pulling down.

Auto or manual trans? There are relatively cheap things to do to the auto to make it MUCH better. Woitht he manual keep the fluid chnaged and overfill until it eats the DMF then go with a SB replacement.

Smarty or EFI Live for a tuner to get rid of the emissions tune. Boost fooler to drop EGT's.

 

No emissions tune on the 06's that I know of. And the EFI live is expensive as hell and it's not for amateur diesel bombers. Smarty, need too many mods for it, but the JR is ok.

Transmission: valve body, torque converter, and a deeper pan are usually the top mods.

Fuel system: better lift pump. Don't go with a fass or airdog as the pumps don't last cause they have to force fuel through a tighter filter element, which then will starve the CP3, then the injectors. Starve the injectors and it gets expensive, quick!!! All you need to do is disable the stock pump, add a fuel line extension so you don't run out of fuel at a quarter tank, then stick a fuel pump in between the fuel line at the frame. 7 micron filter in the stock filter bowl, and change it every 3k miles, or once a month.

That should do it as I'm sure your not gonna try and build a hot rod diesel.

 

The stock tune is emissions oriented. Timing, duration, boost, essentially the whole operation is keyed to emissions not efficiency. One has to advance the timing and get the TQ peak back down where it usable to increase the efficiency. Smarty does that very well.

One needs ZERO mods to run a Smarty Sr, just have to be smart about how you drive it. For the extra $$ the Sr is well worth the investment for the extra features and baout the safest thing you can buy and use without extensive knowledge. Not that does not mean you won't hurt things if you try to crank things to the limit but thats why there are so many settings.

Unless one wants to race or sled pull the in-tank pump is way more than adequate for a solid 400-450 HP truck. It will push fuel thru a 3 um filter and maintain adequate pressure in 99% of normal driving scenarios.

A FASS or AirDog is a good investment but you have to do it correctly. The biggest mistake is NOT upgrading the fuel cannister. The pump will work better and last as lot longer if it doesn't have to work so hard to draw fuel. However, unless you want consistent power over 500 its not really needed.

 

Just background that I left out of my first post...right now I've got an MBRP 5" exhaust, AFE dry element stage 2, the truck is the 48RE auto and I just bought an BD Diesel intake elbow that I'm going to put on. The next purchase was going to be the tuner and I was thinking about the Smarty. With the stock transmission, I believe I can only go to program #3, is that right?

I want to go Smarty, because I've heard so many good things and the capability is there if I upgrade other things on the truck later on. Do I absolutely need gauges at this point? Also with the smarty sr. and its tire height adjustment feature; when you set the tire height, it adjusts the speedometer, but does it also adjust gear shift points automatically?

Does "in-tank" mean stock? Should I even mess around with a pump at this time?

-Lucky13Sgt

 

IMO, you don't need a different LP yet. You don't have enough mods to warrant it. To do an AD or FASS correctly is $800-1000. There are other things you need worse. Plan on doing the LP system correctly and you will be a lot happier. I have 190k plus on the stock LP and it will still provide adequate fuel for everything I normally do. It will not if I wanted to race or run WOT throttle a lot but thats not what my truck is used for. Define your use and then you can build accordingly.

Smarty tuner, my experience. I ran on SW3 and SW5, about an 80\20 split, and did a lot of towing 6-12k. Did not thrash it, did not race. It took 40k to curn the direct clutch pack out of a stock transmission. Yes, you can run 3 and 5 if your careful BUT not for ever. I also ran a lot on TQ3, whihc I believe helped the demise of the tans. Stay on 2 and your experience may vary.

Resetting the tires size correctly just changes the how the ECU reads speed form the ABS sensor. It does not change shift points, patterns, etc. That is all driven off of relationships between wheel speed and throttle position. Worse than the wheel speed, the TQ management removal cause many issues because there is no good way to compensate for more power with less throttle UNLESS you fix the inherent hard part issues. A shift enhancer is mandatory if want to change TQ but it will only bandaid the situation. The transmission will not like it.

With a Smarty I highly reccommend you update the trans. Shift kit, billet front servo, billet accumulator, billet front band strut and anchor. This will allow you to better utilize extra power and address the major weaknesses of a stock trans. These can all be done without dropping the trans.

This will not fix the sloppy TC or the front flex band. These 2 areas are where you will have issues after fixing the above.

Gauges - yes you NEED gauges. You need gauges on a stock truck so you know what is happening. Once you know what the norm is the gauges will tell ahead of time if there are developing problems. Get them, learn them, use them. You need boost, pyro, LP pressure, rail pressure, trans temp at a minimum. If you want 1 more to fill up 2 3 gauage pods add a drive pressure gauge to monitor driving habits.

Welcome to the slippery slope. Enjoy the ride.

 

An Airdog or FASS is a good investment, and yes you should have gauges. If you step right into a smarty, then you will catch the bug. Have fun and take care of that trans.

 

Slipper slope is right!

 

Put a good fuel filter on it and don't touch a thing... Leave it stock, your wallet will thank you. I, for one, really wish I would have taken this advice when I first bought my truck.