96-98 Difference??
 

So I've been looking into purchasing a second gen. cummins 4x4 ext. cab short bed mannual tranny but I don't understand what the difference is between 96, 97, and a 98. I know there are more yrs for a sec. gen but these are the yrs I'd rather own. If someone could answer this for me and kinda give your opinion on which one would be better for me to go with that would be greatly appreciated.

Injection pump is increased and I believe different cams thru out the years, 97-98 have more horsepower than 96

ok thanks, what are cams? I'm totally new to talking about trucks.

The Cam- AKA Camshaft is what runs the valves such as the intake and exhaust on the truck, and can be used to increase performance for different tunes of a engine...

Ok makes sense thanks for all the help!!

but they all produce the same torque so I wouldent worry to much about it...

The most noticable difference to me is that 96 got a slightly beefier tranny than 94 amd 95, and the 98 12 valves had a completely different interior than 94-97. That is all off the top of my head, but I will probably think of some thimg elselater.

what size pump is on the 94-96 and what size is on the 97-98?

95-95 auto = 160 small camshaft, not so great for high RPMS
94-95 manual = 175 small camshaft, not so great for high RPMS
96-98 auto = 180 probably the most saught after
96-98 manual = 215 retards timing at higher rpms

How does it retard the timing at higher rpms?