Hey guys, just some questions for ya. I bought my first diesel 07 mega 5.9 not too long ago. I dont currently tow with it and bought it for the great mileage, compared to my Hemi I had , and the power. We do plan on getting a trailer in a year or two but I can only afford one toy at a time. Heres my problem, during the week my wife drives it too work and goes aprox 3-4 miles each way we do drive alot longer distances on the weekend . I understand that with short trips that dont get the motor up to operating temp can cause carbon build up and moisture as it would in a gas as well. With this being said if I take the extra steps to warm it up in the morning for 5 min. run it and then let the turbo timer do the rest for 2 min, change the oil every 5000 miles, and get it out on the highway every couple of weeks and give it a good run to blow out some carbon is this going to keep the engine healthy or am I setting myself upfor disaster? I apperciate your time and comments. I love my truck and want to keep her running perfect.

 

diesels gotta work and yes short trips are hell on them. for best results i have been told to work em cause thats what they are made to do

 

yeah i would get something else for that short of a trip, just alot of wear on stuff by not gettin up to oper temps and then shutting her down

 

i would just let it warm up for a few minutes and than run it.

 

still gotta pull her and make her work warming it up aint gonna make much of a difference still gonna gunk up. once again worst thing for em is not to work em and make short trips

 

1.Do not idle! It is useless, because your engine doesn't get operating temperature quickly enough. Instead of that deposits will build up much more quickly! Instead of this prewarm your coolant(electric heater). 3 hours earlier before left off will be enough. If you have the money to afford, built in a so called blue heater. It's an auxiliary heater with enough power to heat up your engine and your cab. It will give you the ability to heat up the engine without home power.
2. Change oil as under heavy duty conditions! Usually half mileage as usual.
3. Drive longer distances to avoid condensation of moisture in the engine block and oil!
But do not beat under any circumstances the engine. Use of high quality oil is recommended.
4. and last: Maybe a small commuter car makes sense!


5. Remember a cold engine gets more fuel injected by the ECM. So your mpg's will be always bad.

 

3-4 miles buy her a moped but she might you

 

I don't know where you live but modern diesels, particularly the cummins does not like to be idled. Under no circumstances should anyone do this as it will cause waxing, scoring and in the newer trucks the EGR to plug solid.

You don't need a turbo timer but it won't hurt anything. The rule of thumb there is that every 100 miles is 60 seconds of cool down or until your EGT gauge shows below 300 F (pre-turbo). The Cummins will cool down very quickly as it does not generate heat at idle. This can be dangerous in cold weather which is why most guys have a high idle feature or a brake installed to give them the load on the motor to heat it up. This goes for your situation too in some aspects but if it isn't cold out the computer won't do it for you.

On another matter don't bother doing the oil at 5000 miles - you are wasting yout money. Again, anyone that is telling you that just wants to part it from your wallet. It is not needed. Run the oil in the truck for 10,000 miles and then if you really want to challenge convention switch out to a class 4 full synthetic like AMSOIL and never change it again. In fact it is more important, again even more so on the new trucks, to change the fuel filter(s) than it is to do the oil.

I can tell you from experience how bad short trips are for your Cummins - my old 2002 gets less than 14 MPG on short trips and better than 23 MPG on the freeway. In the winter this is even worse as the short trips the truck doesn't even make it up to temperature and this is like running it dry. As explained above, this is bad. If you can't do the HWY burn the carbon out you can always load it up with box weight and drive it around town so that the motor is working. The harder it is worked the better you will see it perform.

 

are u using any fuel additives

 

Who, him or I?

The new trucks don't really need additives as long as the owner uses ULSD in the tank. Generally the use of these is recommended under heavy hauling, poor fuel quality and cold winter conditions. Things are much different with say your 12V though.