Just getting interested in diesel mod. I have an 07 2 wd 5.9L dually (all stock) that i use to haul horse and cattle trailer with. Looking for some advice on possible upgrades to help mileage/power. Thinking about smarty jr and new exhaust. Any advice would be helpful.

 

Depending on how much money you are looking at spending, I installed a homemade BHAF using an Amsoil 4090 filter and gutting my stock tourque tube this cost me about $70 and removed the turbo silencer ring. I also run 4" straight pipe the pipe from the removed muffler was about $15. But a lot of my friends that have the 5.9 said the Banks intake with ram tube, and a MBRP 4" exhaust. Just depends on how much money you want to spend.

 

Set of Gauges, Smarty Jr and 5" Turbo Back Exhaust.

 

My '06 has the Airaid Cold Air and the Banks High-Ram. Also has a 4" Turbo-back MBRP exhaust. Between those, my Hypertech Max Energy, and just a few other minor things, I am getting 26-26.5 MPG in the summer in Fairbanks / North Pole Alaska. But that's babying it, which is hard to do when you have that much power to play with. And that's also with the 6-speed manual, too. Winter mileage isn't anywhere near that, between the type of fuel used at -40F and the fact that you really don't turn your truck off all that much unless you can plug it in. My goal is to somehow get 30 MPG out of this thing, which will probably take water/meth, lock-out hubs, my Airdog that I have and haven't installed yet, and compound turbo and +90 injector combo. Gonna give it a shot, though!

 

you truck has a 4" exhaust that comes stock depending on where you live you may be able to delete the cat on it and delete the muffler just did my for $120, it help out alot on the MPG.

 

This is true. However, the difference between my turbo-back mandrel bent 4" and my buddies cat-delete stock 4" is conciderable. The stock crush-bending does no one any favors. Neither does that stock muffler and rasonator! For the money, I'd do it once and be done. MPG increases were substaintial. Just my $0.02.

 

My 07 4" stock is not a crush-bent its is a mandrel-bending stock system, O I did say had my muffler delete too. If your 06 came with a crush-bent system then that is a first that i have heard from factory system but I would not be surprised . My 97 had a 3" mandrel-bent and i replaced it with a 4". All my friends that have diesels either have stock 3" or 4" stock and theirs are all mandrel-bent I don't know why yours and your friends came with a crush-bent system . Just saying.

 

i took out my cat and muffler, got muffler from a 6.7 cummins it is a foot long resonator that as the right hangers and just welded in a length of pipe where the old muffler and cat were, also did a home made intake using a k&n and reusing the gutted sock tourque tube got a deal so cost me 45$

make sure if you are towing and you are adding a programer get guages! i just got an edge jwa i like it because it has all the guages included and i searched for a bit and got the whole setup for 500 bucks smarty is good too i had one on my previous truck just be sure you are watching those egts also if you have an automatic dont get crazy with the hp without beefing it up with a valve body, and tourque converter maybe billet shafts depending on what your plans are for the truck

 

FYI - Dodge trucks with the Cummins engine use a 4" Compression Bending, NOT Mandrel Bending, proceedure at the factory. Look closer and you will see what I mean. Not sayin' anything, I'm just sayin'.

A great place to see it is where the down-pipe/intermediate hangs a 60* aft bend at the back/bottom of the engine compartment. Or where the hump takes place at the rear axle. You'll be able to see quite clearly where the inside radius of the bend goes flat right in the center of the bend. That's not to be confused with the type of bending that causes the inside radius to wave into a washboard looking mess (which compression bending CAN do, but none of our bends are sharp, nor steep (short radius'd), enough to get quite that bad). Mandrel bending is a somewhat time consuming process if you had to do it for every truck leaving the line. I know how long it takes just to mandrel an AN-6 or -8 stainless 3000 PSI Pressure line for our helicopters hydraulic systems. Our hydro guys spend some time getting it right and learning to be good at it. It's a science. The -10 or -12 return lines can be compression bent, as they are aluminum and only run at about 60 PSI. The compression bends on a return line look identical to my trucks exhaust. If, for some reason, they were able to cause flat bending in my exhaust while using a mendrel, then they are freakin' ar-tards. My MBRP system had Z E R O flat spots in it. The stock one I took off had flat spots in several places. Again, if you look closely, I'm sure you'll see it, too.

Regardless, an after market turbo-back exhaust flows so much better than stock that it's one of the top priorities I would concider if you have the funds for it. Cold Air Intake, Intake Manifold, and Turbo-Back Exhaust is what I'd plan on before programming it. Aspiration is the name of the game. Same thing the gasser guys have to worry about. It plagues every vehicle out there that has to meet some rediculous emissions standard. And that's why after market exhaust guys make a living!

 

i would could reccommend a smarty jr, 5" straight pipe and an air raid drop in filter. That is what my truck has an has alot more power than stock and its no extreme mods, but be careful power is addictive and don't forget a good set of gauges if your towing for sure. (i reccommend issopro)