The Story Of A Cummins Suburban (Lots Of Pics)

[mosesburb]

What i really mean is, i wonder if that would have crossed my mind, or if i wouldn't have thought of it and ended up pulling the motor or some how tilting it.

I think so. After you remember how much of a bitch it is taking the grille/core support/CAC/condenser/radiator out. Then remembering how heavy the whole friggin motor was. Then realizing you can't tilt the motor because of spatial limitations. Yeah, I think you would have lifted the push rods up until they went "tink" on the firewall, grabbed the Sharpie and circled the point of impact, then grabbed the 90*drill with the Hugh Jass Klein Unibit and got after it. Well, maybe you would have used a torch and lit the insulation you installed on fire, but probably not.

 

[mosesburb]

So I can finally get back to my auxiliary heater installation. Well, not so fast. Come to find out, the Optima in this pic has a bad cell:

I know, an Optima with a bad cell is so unusual and unique. Well, not so much as my S10 pickup barfed an Optima at this same time. Yup, bad cell. Imagine that. That one was still under warranty so I got it replaced, but the Suburban units were not under warranty. I stopped buying Optimas a couple years ago since their quality has completely tanked. I have not bought a battery that is not an Optima since 1989. I could not even guess as to how many I have purchased for my fleet and sold to my customers. This goes back to when they had offset posts. Fantastic batteries. They were a minimum six to seven year battery and out here that was unheard of. Even though they were big money, they were an easy purchase because you knew it was going to last a long time. Well, not anymore. They get just out of warranty and fail. Just like any other cheap battery, but these are not cheap batteries. I am tired of it. I want to say it is when they were bought by Johnson Controls and moved to Mexico, but I can't say for sure that is when they went south (went south, LOL!!) Anyway, I started researching Optima alternatives and there are a few now. I think the best commercially available AGM battery is the Odyssey. Amazing power for a given group size. Not everyone has them, but Die Hard Platinums are Odyssey batteries even though they claim they are not. One drawback to Odyssey batteries is the cost. They are pricey. Sometimes the Die Hard Platinums can be gotten on sale, but that is usually the best price available. Over priced?? I would not say that as they are REALLY good batteries.

Another readily available HIGH quality AGM battery is made by East Penn Manufacturing in The United States of America and sold under the Deka name. Anybody familiar with electric commodity handling equipment knows the Deka name. Forklifts, pallet jacks, man lifts etc, Deka has a battery for it. Their name is not as well known in the automotive battery market, but it should be. They make an AGM battery that lasts like the old Optimas did. Real good batteries, for a price that is typically a fair bit less than Optima's. I called East Penn Manufacturing and asked if I could buy direct from their facility in town here and they said I could, but that I could also buy from one of their distributors. He threw a couple names out there and I knew of one that was far away and the other I would not do business with, but then he said that Batteries Plus sells the Deka battery with their house brand label on it. I knew they used to (I have bought a few already), but I didn't know they still did. So I went up to Batteries Plus an picked up a couple Deka AGM Intimidator X2 batteries. My wallet left seeing stars, but I left saying Woo Hoo!! No more Optimas in my truck!!

Well, that presents another problem, or five. I built my battery trays to fit an Optima 34/78 or SCU34 or whatever number they are calling them now. It is basically a group 34/78 battery. A group 34 has top posts and a 78 has side posts (same size footprint for both batteries) and the Optima has both so it is basically a group 34/78. The only problem with Optima's classification of the 34/78 is their battery is about 1/4" shorter in length than a standard 34/78 battery case like the Deka uses. Being that I made my trays for the Optimas, I had to remake my trays. This all started as an auxiliary heater install.....

Ok, so the trays have to come out and be extended about 3/8". Lotta damn work for 3/8". So this brings out my power steering issues. Huh?? How the hell did we go from batteries to trays to power steering?!? Well, the driver side battery tray has some hoses running through the lower supports that require the hoses to be removed to facilitate the removal of the battery tray. Easy enough, right?? Well, not quite. Every time I have to get into the power steering system it takes a MINIMUM of three days to bleed the air out of the system. Then, a month later, I will take the cap off to check the level for maintenance purposes and it will throw up fluid out of the reservoir. Did it make fluid?? How did that happen?? I had thought from way back that a remote reservoir would help the situation, so I started looking around at different products available. I found PSC has a new reservoir that they didn't make when I built the truck originally. It is a super sweet deal that has return ports for the gear box and the hydroboost and a feed line to the pump. The BEST PART is it has an integral filter that can be changed without opening up the system like my spin-on required. Take the cap off, take a 5/16-18 bolt out, remove the filter, install a new filter and you're done. So simple. So easy. So expensive. This is becoming a VERY expensive month. So here it is along with the corresponding can for the pump:

I wanted to use the clamp, but I couldn't get it where I wanted it so I ended up using the mounting holes in the bottom and side of the base. I welded some bracketry to the side of my newly modified battery tray to hang it off of:

Then I hung the reservoir off of it. I bought some JIC push on fittings for the feed line from the reservoir to the pump, but I forgot to get the JIC push on fittings for the return lines so I ended up using weld-on AN fittings on the ends of the return tubes coming from the hydroboost and cooler, the using braided Teflon lined hose and fittings for the return lines because I had that stuff at the house. My wallet was giving me the finger over that slip of the mind.

Ok, so what?? How does it work?? In a word, great. I had 95% or more of the air out of the system before I ever started it just by cycling the wheel back and forth probably about a dozen times, but definitely less than twenty. I used to start with about sixty cycles of the wheel, then start the motor and let the emulsification begin. Bleh. No more. This thing is great. PSC has some great tech info on their site as well. That is where I learned my cooler was mounted incorrectly. I had it mounted ports down and on a stacked plate cooler it needs to be mounted ports up or to one side. When mounted to one side the flow is very specific. In on the bottom, out on the top. Otherwise air gets trapped at the top and strange problems occur--like somehow throwing up fluid a month later. The new configuration is visible in this pic:

I actually did all of that work in my driveway, in the rain, in full rain gear. That sucked. I could not lose the weekend. I had to have this ready for a run and taking the easy way out and not working because of the rain was going to keep the truck out of service for this run and I didn't want to miss it. If you ever want to make a long day longer, do it in rain gear. So I think I can get back to my auxilliary heater install now. I hope...

 

[ashman]

fantastic write up man. it's amazing how 1 simple job can balloon into several. /doh

 

[Eat Soot]

I'm not 100% sure you will get to the aux heater at this point! You have had a tough run here lately! Great write up and story, It kinda cool how you have been fixing but also updating to better parts as you go....although you wallet is pissed! PSC makes some very nice products.....only need 90 days same as cash program! HA! Keep up the good work......or hopefully not at this point.

 

[mosesburb]

fantastic write up man. it's amazing how 1 simple job can balloon into several. /doh

Thanks!! Yeah, I'm not sure if this was a snowball or an avalanche. I can't complain too much as the problems DID occur in my driveway and not out in the middle of nowhere, hours and hours away from the nearest town. I will never fault a part that has the decency to fail in the driveway.

I'm not 100% sure you will get to the aux heater at this point! You have had a tough run here lately! Great write up and story, It kinda cool how you have been fixing but also updating to better parts as you go....although you wallet is pissed! PSC makes some very nice products.....only need 90 days same as cash program! HA! Keep up the good work......or hopefully not at this point.

It was a real fun month and a half or so. I did re-learn something very early on and that is I really prefer driving it over working on it.

 

[azblazer]

I have been buying all my batteries from Batteries Plus since early 09. Lets just say i had the 79's wiring gutted looking for a draw do to an Optima issue. I mean who would fault a brand new battery...grrrr.

 

[max 02]

Man you do nice work! And great write ups too...interesting, informative and funny. Not that is funny to have problems.

Just like to read your thread and look at your pictures.

 

[mosesburb]

I have been buying all my batteries from Batteries Plus since early 09. Lets just say i had the 79's wiring gutted looking for a draw do to an Optima issue. I mean who would fault a brand new battery...grrrr.

Not me. Well, I would now, but if you had not mentioned it I sure would not have. The most popular failure in my fleet is definitely the dead cell. I have had a few others, but the dead cell is definitely the champ lately.

Man you do nice work! And great write ups too...interesting, informative and funny. Not that is funny to have problems.

Just like to read your thread and look at your pictures.

Thanks!! I appreciate you taking the time to post up.

 

[mosesburb]

The auxiliary heater installation. Sounds easy enough. Didn't see the head gasket coming, nor the cylinder head refresh. The batteries, oof. The power steering update/modifications. None of it. I just want to install my auxiliary heater. Now why in the world does a cat from Phoenix need an auxiliary heater?? Good question. After a run up south of Williams in early fall where I had some issues with the "buddy" heaters (both little Buddy and the regular Buddy Heater) I started looking at alternatives. The Buddy heaters work ok(ish) in ideal situations, but they have their drawbacks in my situation. With three people in the cabin, it gets a bit crampt making enough room to safely burn a Buddy heater. Also, the fiberboard headliner gets really hot above the heater. Getting the catalyst brick to light off when it is cold and at altitude takes quite awhile and while it is trying to heat up it is burning way fat and stinking up the inside of the truck. Not ideal.

I first looked at air heaters like the ones that are used in the sleepers on big trucks. They have their positive attributes (they make a ton of hot air), but to me, seem to have more negative ones. They need alot of free space around them. The combustion occurs inside the unit, inside the cabin of the vehicle. Makes some noise. My buddy Lance had one in his Sportsmobile and was not thrilled with it. That got me to looking at other possibilities. There is a heater that is similar to the air heater, but it heats coolant instead of air. Hmmm, this could solve a couple problems.

One of the obvious problems would be cabin heat, but another less obvious is cold starting. Now when I refer to cold starting I'm not talking about cold in Phoenix. 20* in PHX is not the same as 20* in Flagstaff. Besides the altitude, the 20* there is more "real" whereas the PHX 20* will only be there until the sun comes up, but even at that a quick bump of the starter and it will run. It will not do that in a genuine cold situation. If you haven't experienced it, search YouTube for "Cummins cold start". Mine sounds that bad. The heater is installed in between the engine and the heater core. It has a pump in it that will pump the coolant when the heater is running and the engine is not. It has a controller that will turn the blower motor on low to defrost the windows. After the heated water goes through the heater core, it flows into the engine where it warms that up as well. It is really an amazing setup.

The heater: It is a Webasto Blue Heat unit. This is the full pimp model. I even got the remote control unit for it. Push the button on the key fob and it starts. No leaving the house, motel room or sleeping bag in the back.

That is the basic install. It has no hoses going to it yet, but it is the only pic that I got of the unit. It is amazingly compact for what it does. It drinks diesel fuel to the tune of .8gal/10hrs. It required a dip tube be installed in the fuel tank:

So I didn't want to run the blower motor all night off and on. It is quite a distance away from the back and it draws a fair bit of amperage. A rear heater assembly would be better. I dug through a heater core catalog and came up with a couple options. The first one did not work for size reasons. The second one did work and quite well at that. It needed an enclosure so I fabbed one up that was fairly compact.

I realized after I had gotten most of it tacked together that I had the expanded metal rotated a bit. I thought about cutting it apart, but that's about as far as I got. I need a fan now. I was talking to my buddy Russ (Russ' 24hr Machine Service) and he had built a new computer recently and had a fan on it that moved ridiculous amounts of air. I got the name and ordered one from Newegg. Fifteen bones and free shipping. Sweet deal!! It moves a fair bit of air, is absolutely silent and pulls a maximum .25 amp.

So I am going to mount it right behind the third door. It will pull the air from the spare tire area. That means the air I am going to try to heat will run along side a very cold quarter panel. I pulled the panel and washed out the inside of the quarter and installed some FatMat acoustic insulation and then went over that with the foil coated bubble wrap stuff for thermal insulation.

Then I needed a new interior panel. I had been rocking the original cardboard units with the vinyl covering, but they were not going to be able to deal with the hole that I needed to cut in them. Something else was needed. Enter a sheet of metal way thicker than it needed to be.

First I made a template off the old one. Then I laid the template in place in the truck and cut out the hole I needed to clear the heater core. Then I transferred that onto the sheet metal and got after it with a plasma cutter.

Then I added a reinforcement rib and some sound deadener to the back side of the new panel and put some carpet on the outside:

Then I added it all together and came up with this:

The heater hoses run in front of the right rear tire: (the zip ties were a temporary deal--they have been replaced with factory Adel clamps)

I figured this was asking for problems so I got a mud flap to cut up to fill the space and give the hoses some armor. Got this Koneta Safety Guard Anti Sail/Anti Spray unit courtesy of the back curbing at the Love's truck stop in beautiful (gack) downtown Eloy AZ.

Laid out the dimensions on it:

Cut it and fit it into place:

So there it is. My heater is finally installed and we are ready to go. Or are we??

 

[82355]

I installed hundreds of Espars in semi cabs. We mounted them in fairly tight areas under the bed. I think you could have gotten away with it, but what you have is better for the cold starts like you mentioned. Too bad you don't have room for an APU, then you could have air conditioning as well!

Martin

 

[ashman]

That is a saweeeet unit! I'd never heard of a heater like that. That should make life a lot more comfortable.

 

[y5mgisi]

Very good work as usual!

 

[mosesburb]

I installed hundreds of Espars in semi cabs. We mounted them in fairly tight areas under the bed. I think you could have gotten away with it, but what you have is better for the cold starts like you mentioned. Too bad you don't have room for an APU, then you could have air conditioning as well!

Martin

Yeah, the air heater probably would have worked, but my buddy Lance had something melt that got too close to something on it. That and it would be mounted to a wood floor really didn't thrill me. But yes, the coolant deal is a MUCH better option. I have thought about a/c before, but I am trying not to get too carried away with that (I do have a working idea though....).

That is a saweeeet unit! I'd never heard of a heater like that. That should make life a lot more comfortable.

Thanks. I learned of them six, maybe eight months ago, but did not really pay attention to them. I was looking at options for heating and most came back to LP, which works good, but I would have to carry another type of fuel. This thing has a really big reservoir to draw off of.

The thing that got me going on this heater idea (besides waking up and seeing our breath in the truck) was a pic that Larry posted awhile back. It was captioned something to the effect of "cold night, but warm inside" and "I really wish I had a diesel engine in my truck....." I may have ad-libbed the latter, but I know that's how he really feels. Anyways, the pic posted with that caption was this one:

That got me to thinking that we don't do enough camping in winter. It also reminded me I hate the cold. That made me start thinking of a way to effectively heat the cabin while we sleep. After a whole lot of brain scratching and research into various options, I finally settled on this unit. So far I really like it.

Very good work as usual!

Thank you sir!!

 

[mosesburb]

So all of this thrashing leads us to the reason for the timeframe. Another Old Iron Run. Pre 1980 vehicles only. Some o fyou may remember the one from last year that got snowed out (sort of). This one went much better--no hotels involved.

Mike and Melissa in their 1971 F250 High Boy arrived Friday along with three Pinzgauers and one Volvo 6x6. We made the journey from Phoenix along with two early Broncos Saturday morning.

The late arrivals:

The high point is Signal peak with the entrance to Kofa Queen Canyon to the left.:

Lunch time:

Tailings pile from the North Star mine:

KofA butte:

Camp Saturday night:

....scenery:

Hellecious guard dog(s):

Everyone cut out Sunday at lunch except for Mike and Melissa and Us/Lance. This left just the two vehicles to run the rest of the trails. Wilburn Cabin: a few miles after we left here, we came upon this cat and his buddy on quads, one pulling a trailer. He inquired about whether this was the correct trail to Wilburn Cabin and the condition of the trail and the cabin. He said he had not been here in 27 years when he brought his great aunt, whose husband (his great uncle) had built the cabin, in for the dedication of the Kofa NWR. The cabin was in great shape and had a couple bed frames in it and there was a sign saying that people were welcome to stay/camp there.

Even has a shower:

After we left Wilburn Cabin, we hit the trail toward Kofa Cabin. We had to widen several miles of it. I cleaned a whole bunch of brush/debris out of the interior of my truck from this trail:

Mike and Melissa climbing a hill:

The Pinzers and the Volvo, all being on portals, would have really enjoyed what happened shortly after that pic was taken. The metal in my hand was transported to that spot by my differentials. It was removed by some very strategically placed rocks in the center of the trail that the Pinzers and the Volvo would not have even had to adjust the placement of their trucks to cross without incident. I can picture them lining up their lawn chairs in a row watching the show while pointing and giggling, then driving their trucks back and forth across the "obstacle" explaining how they fail to understand the problem. Maybe not. LOL.

We arrived at the Kofa Cabin. It was also open for people to spend the night in. It had a 55gal drum wood stove and a couple bed frames in it. Lance took th eopportunity and slept in there that night.

After a much cooler night, we packed up and headed out. Quartzite to Vicksburg via Kofa NWR took us 166 miles (30 miles on the highway). We pointed the trucks west toward the Harquahala Mountain.

That's where we are going. Right to the top.

This fairly represents a good portion of the trail, but there are a few pretty nasty sections:

There is a section in this pic toward the top that got so bad they installed concrete:

Yes, it IS that steep:

Here is what is currently residing at the top:

So all in all it was a great trip. We met a whole bunch of great people and got to see a bunch of cool trucks. It would have been better if the early leavers could have run with us on Monday, but I understand all too well about the whole "required attendance" at work. I hope to be able to share a trail with the other participants in the future and if the opportunity presents itself, I highly recommend it to others. Our thanks again go to Mike and Melissa for another great trip.

 

[azblazer]

This so reminds me of years ago when zilla aka big bob and i would explore every weekend...

 

[mosesburb]

This so reminds me of years ago when zilla aka big bob and i would explore every weekend...

Well, if you'd let me know when you slink into town, one of these trips could be your own....

 

[y5mgisi]

Your trips always make me want to have trips of my own! Stuck in town all too often.

 

[mosesburb]

So as we got off the freeway to drop Lance off at his place, I noticed a new vibration at idle. Swell. I loooooove vibrations. Ugh. We dropped him off and headed home. I was trying to see what actions would affect the vibration. I really couldn't pinpoint anything in particular. It seemed to run fine, stop fine, no real issues other than this odd vibration. We got home, unloaded the truck, blew it out and I got to looking around. One item I forgot to mention in the previous avalanche of parts installed was a transmission mount. The one that was in there had failed completely at some point. It wasn't in failed mode very long because I remember looking at the clearance between the transfer case and the skid plate and noticed it seemed to be getting closer to the plate. When I noticed it had failed, the case was almost touching the plate. I think it had been failing for awhile, but finally let go. I installed a factory GM mount before we left. All was well with that, but mot so much with the motor mounts.

A little back-story on that trail up to Harquahala Peak is that much of it was nice dirt trail. Some of it was a little loose/rutted, etc--typical trail. There were a few spots that were very steep and very loose. This cause the truck to bounce up and down while not going forward or backward--just up and down, shock-loading the living daylights out of the drivetrain. This is all with the new trans mount. So I have a broken motor mount now. Not a surprise considering what the truck experienced getting us to the top. I'm actually a little surprised it was only one.

So, now I need new motor mounts. No biggie, I just used stock Dodge mounts from the dealer when I built it, I'll just go to Dodge and get some more. Well, I did a little research before I went to Dodge and found that it seems Dodge mounts are no longer domestically produced anymore. Swell. I despise aftermarket mounts because they are total crap and now it seems Dodge is selling them in their own boxes. I found reports of premature failures which does not go well with what I do with my vehicle. What now?? well, in my research I came across Auto World out of Great Falls MT. They make a urethane mount that replaces the original 1st gen Cummins mount. Now I am no fan of urethane mounts at all. They have their place, but my truck is not one of them. I decide to give them a call and see what they have to say. I really want a rubber mount because when my motor is idling, it is not felt in the truck. Totally smooth. I REALLY like that.

So I call Auto World and get this lady on the phone. I asked her a few questions about the mounts explaining that I really wanted original rubber, but it seems they are crap now. She confirms that they are indeed crap now and because of this they contacted an unnamed urethane mount manufacturer to make some quality mounts. I stated my reasons for not wanting urethane--excessive vibration transfer being the biggest reason. She said they had this urethane company make a set of mounts that they promptly installed in their C30 shop truck with a Cummins. They promptly removed them and sent them back because they were too hard. Transferred too much vibration. The urethane company sent another set. they sent them back. Too hard. I *think* it was the fourth set that ended up being the right durometer. She said their mounts are actually slightly "deader" than the oe mounts. I say OK, hook this brother up. They are pricey, but they are domestic and this lady sounds like she knows her product very well. I'm rolling the dice here.

They arrived and I really liked what I saw. The next day I pulled the mounts out and replaced them with these. They are IDENTICAL in EVERY way to the original mounts. I could not find any discrepancies between the new and the old mounts. Very impressive.

This was the cause of my new vibration:

No good no more.

So, a whole bunch of money on some super-double-throw-down-wizz-bang mounts. Yep. Worth every last penny too. I honestly did not think I would be as impressed as I was, but these things are everything the nice lady said they were and maybe even more. They dampen vibration every bit as well as the original rubber mounts did. Obviously I have not had them off road yet, nor on a super loose, super steep hill climb, but so far they are fantastic. I am very glad I found them.

Another issue that arose was the left headlight stopped functioning. Once again, no worries as this trail definitely threw enough vibrations at the truck to kill a headlight (or ten). These halogens were salvaged out of the truck I parted out for the first drivetrain I put in this truck (big block, th475, 205, 3/4T axles), so who knows how old they actually are. They were plenty bright, but when in Rome, see what else is available, right?? Well, I am no fan of these lamp assemblies that it seems like everyone is selling that take the composite type bulbs. There are too many drawbacks as far as I'm concerned. I want something stupid simple (pretty much the theme of this truck). If I take a stone to a lamp, I want to be able to stop at the Kwik-E-Mart and grab a replacement, not place an order for a new housing--special order, we only sell them in pairs etc. I don't want to modify my harness, etc. Anyways, I went to the local cheesy chain store to see what they had. The cat there said these are good. They were a little over double the price of standard halogens, but what the hell, after the last month of parts outlay, what's a few more??

Sylvania Silver Stars:

This is a shot of the old halogen:

This is the Silver Star:

When I did this I realized I had never tried to take pics of headlights before. It is more difficult than i thought it would be. In the first pic it is pretty yellow. In the second pic it is more white. That is actually a pretty good representation of the difference in light color. The new ones are very white. I didn't want blue. I don't like those. Bright?? Yes, but not for me. I was really trying to determine if they were brighter and whiter etc, but I really couldn't tell for sure until one night when I was leaving work and pulled the headlights on and was amazed at how bright they were. Brighter and whiter than my work truck with two new composite headlamp assemblies running 9004 bulbs. Very impressive.

Simple headlamp change for a big improvement in light output. Well, not quite. Leave it to me to require a TIG welder to change a headlight:

The damn tab broke off the retaining ring. I went into my stash and found another ring, but it was too different, so I cleaned up the tab, grabbed the stainless rod and welded it back on.

Nothing simple for me it seems....

 

[azblazer]

The oil patch has afforded me many a night time mile running here and there.
And the silverstars are a good upgrade...but still just not good enough.
I no longer have anything with round headlights in it or i would have liked to
try out the new LED headlights uncle sams misfits are using these days.
The Jimmy...like the dodge...has 3 pricey 8" LaPaz series Baja Design offroad
lights up front. Big Dave talked me into a set of Rigid Dually D2's up front to
fill the empty light mount holes on the ORD front bumper. All i can say is Dohhh.
The 3 Baja Design lights are now obsolete...ie: candle versus omg in light output.
Pricey..yes. However when i need to see bambi slightly before he see's me...
my money is on the LED's! In fact as soon as i can afford it those 3 lights will be
replaced with a 30" bar!
I have also ran the um more than likely illegal HID kit on the dodge and all i can say is un fair advantage goes to me. I dumped them due to the single bulb aspect...they rotated or extended the bulb forward when one hit the high beams....but i did not like the delay (blind as a bat) until they decided to work...and the difused light was horrible.
They do make a 2 bulb housing for my year dodge so i may in the future give that a try.

 

[DEMON44]

I've got the autoworld quad mounts. Just like those you have there. I haven't installed them yet in my superduty, but then the cummins goes in I'll be using them. They appear to be quality.


And I've got 4 LED lights in my bumper center for driving lights. I love them, I love the pure white light they make.