dieseldoc

That is generally the rule I have had a brand new cat tap out of the bag snap off and so have several of my coworkers. I bought my taps and dies from mac and have never had one break on me. My experience with taps is that you definitely get what you pay for. This is one of those tools that you should spend some money on. Thanks for all the suggestions guys I appreciate it.

I have not had a diesel run away on me personally but the dealer I work in now had one take off on them about 10 years ago. They installed a reman long block 3406b. The tech somehow got the fuel line and air/fuel ratio lines mixed up. Needless to say with a -4 fuel line right in the intake. It made a lot of noise and spun very fast. It never threw a rod, but the bearings were toast and the customer got a new engine. It is just a good thing that they did not put the air piping on the turbo before they started it.It just took a while to find something sturdy enough to cut the air off. Now when pump work is done there is a 1/2" thick plywood paddle in the tool room that must be in arms reach before start up.

Thanks for all the input guys. It was a ten hour pain in the ass. I tried the torch trick as a last resort and did not seem to work very well on this tap. I have had it work great on bolts before though. It finally broke up enough to get it out. Fixed the threads with an insert and its holding. My reccomendation is to never ever buy Caterpillar taps. In the ten years I have been wrenching professionally I have had 3 taps break on me two were cat and the cat ones were a bear both times. I knew better than to use it but was in a hurry and did not want to go dig in my service truck in the cold and 30mph wind to get my set. Lesson learned....Thanks again guys

Not sure exactly where this post should be placed but here it is. I have a broken tap stuck in a cylinder head. The broken piece is now to the bottom of the hole and is loose(can wiggle it with a pick). The threads are damage and will now need to be heli-coiled, so they are not in the way. I have tried every trick I have for broken taps and at the end of my wits. I have tried the broken tap socket, a carbide to grind it out, and my last resort breaking it out with a punch and hammer as well as my air hammer. Every other broken tap I have had like this I hit it a couple times with a sharp air hammer point and they shatter or break in to smaller pieces you can blow out with a blow gun, but not this sob. Wondering if anybody has anything else that might work?? Not sure what elso to try here. I am currently trying the go home and drink a couple whiskeys and see if it has fallen out over night plan. Any input appreciated, Have never had a tap this tough to remove.

I too try my best to not go on the tool trucks and stay out of tool stores. It inevitably costs me money to get out of their and generally it is at least a 50 dollar bill or more. "Hi my name is robert and I have a tool addiction" I can think of a lot worse things to be addicted to though, so all in all maybe its not so bad

As long as we are on the subject, has anybody ever put a newer 7.3(00-03) into and older bodystyle(94-97). I know there is many differences(turbo pedestal, turbo, up-pipes, etc, etc). But does it fit with the taller pedesatal and larger turbo. The reason I ask is I have a buddy with a 95 that has a shot motor. He found a 01 that rolled with an excellent motor for super cheap. I know we could change turbo's etc. and it would fit. But if it fits why not use the better turbo set-up. Do the superduty engines have a plug where the mechanical transfer pump used to be or is the hole not even cast at that point. Just wondering if anyone here has tried it. It doesnt matter that it is super cheap if it is going to be 15 hours of screwing around mixing and matching to make a bastard engine, that will be a nightmare to get parts for. Thanks for the input guys, I think we have covered this before now that I think of it after I wrote this post.

Most definitely a possibility. A friend of mine has a 04 dodge that had an intermittent problem of the rail pressure spiking and an occasional surge under load. He asked me to look at it. I told him to unhook the banks, try it for a while and than we will see what happens. He unhooked the banks and has not had a problem since, that was 6 months ago.

Who can hear anything above the engine at 3400rpm in 4 lo with a 525 hp tractor in front of you pulling you to the broken machine????? You want to talk about diagnostic pressure you have to get the machine fixed or you cant go home because your truck is buried to the frame rails. I am not a fan of abusing a truck like this but you have to do what you got to do. That happened to me twice last fall That looks like a way better seal design. You guys wouldnt happen to have a part number for it by chance, and preferred installation method? I like the theory behind that seal and would like to get something back in there before the mud season really gets here. We had 5" of rain total in the last week and a half.

I am kind of with you keith my old trucks never had the seals and I have never replaced the seal due to a leak. I have only put two sets of the inner axles seals and that was during overhaul of the axle. I am not to worried about it,just curious if you guys have found a good way to keep them in place.

This thread starts with an experience on my personal 06 F-250. I had the seals replace at 20,000 miles because they fell out, I know it doesnt seal anything really but keeps the dust and debris away from the inner axle seal. Now at 45,000 miles I notice when servicing the truck last that the seals have fallen out again. I was intrigued by this and began looking down the fleet at work and other trucks I have worked on in the last couple months and 95% of them the seals have fallen out. Is there a trick you guys have come across to keep these seals in place or should a guy just not worry about it? The years range from the 05' 550 I drive at work up to and 09' 350 one of the other guys drive. Havent looked at any 03 or 04s

Although I have not done this particular thing myself yet. I would think that as long as you got a complete engine and matching pcm it should be fairly plug and play. Obviously will need some exhaust mods due to the different downpipe but nothing serious. Please let us know how it turns out I am interested in doing this very same thing but with a little bit older chassis. . . . . . . .

Every Cat engine gets new injector hold down bolts. It was about 5 or 6 years ago I think we had a rash of injector sealing issues. The fix was using new hold down bolts every single time. We also increased the torque on the bolts if I remember correctly. I know ford does not tell us to replace the bolts but I do anyway, cheap insurance. They are pretty little bolts to hold a lot of pressure when you think about it. Just my opinion and practice.

I am with the rest of the guys on this one. Every burnt harness I have replaced or repaired was a result of burnt glow plugs or a missing lock and the connector working loose.

Would it be possible to install your leads before warming it up. Than you could just take the readings when it is flaming hot. Instead of trying to hook everything up when its hot.

Have you looked into arctic fox products? At the cat dealer I work at we are an arctic fox dealer. The products seem to be pretty good quality and reasonably priced. I dont know if they would have something for your application or not but might be worth a look.

I am using my 96 F-250 for this year, I just got into it. I have made it to two pulls this year. My wifes cousin got me into it. He runs a dodge and was giving me shit that my ford couldnt do crap against his dodge. I never pulled before and I was only 5 feet behind him. I have a buddy with a 94 identical to my 96 that he wants to get rid of. I am considering buying that to make it my puller. My 96 has a banks 3.5 inch down pipe and mandrel bent exhaust, with the banks hot housing. I am running the 75hp chip in it when I pull, I have posis in both the axles with 4.10 gears and I am running goodyear wrangler MT/R tires. I found that it is too light and starts to powerhop before I run out of power. I am going to add about 400 lbs of weight in the box and 300-400 lbs in the front and see how I do next time. I pull in the 4 wheel heavy and diesel classes. It has been a lot of fun and keeps me out of trouble.

I have an 06 F-250 with a 6.0 and 6spd, used to be my ride to work. Now it is a garage queen, gets out to pull the wifes horse trailer, and my pullin pick-up to the truck pull, also the travel pick-up. My current daily driver is a 96 F-250 with a 7.3 and 5spd(with a dana 60 out of 350, I hate that twin i-beam suspension). It gets me to work everyday, goes out in the pasture to fix fence, haul feed, hay bales back to the ranch, cows and pretty much anything else you could imagine. My project truck is a 62 f-250 that had a 292 4spd, in the process of a heart transplant(it will be diesel powered by winter). Now on the subject of previously owned I had a bronco 2 in high school that was gray however it should have been friggin yellow, I learned a lot from it and it somewhat got me into my career. I had a pontiac sunbird my first year of college, pretty good car I was more concerned with buying beer and partying than maintenance. It went 30,000 miles that year with no oil change or anything. After that was a chevy with a 6.2 diesel for the mileage. it couldnt accelerate out of a wet paper bag but it got 22mpg doing it. After that it has been many ford diesel pick-ups. As for color all my rigs are RED, just plain red.

thanks a million keith I appreciate it.

Working on an 05' F-550. I am replacing the rear pads and rotors. Since you have to remove the hub to get the rotor off. I was wondering if somebody could help me out with some specs, I forgot my service information discs at home. I am looking for the rear wheel bearing adjusting spec, as well as torque specs for the rotor bolts, caliper bracket bolts, and caliper bolts themselves. I was just going to use standard bolt torque for those but the wheel bearing adjustment procedure would be much appreciated. Thanks in advance guys.

Anybody have a oil filter housing crack and leak oil? It cracked on the front side next to the webbing where it goes to the fuel filter housing. This particular rig is an 06 F-550 with 73,000 miles on it. I havent heard of one of these before. Was a cheap fix though the housing was 120 bucks and change with o-rings. took about 45 minutes to change out. Just wondering if anyone else has run into this before. Must happen from time to time. My dealer ordered from minneapolis and had her the next day.

This sounds a little bit like the muscle care horsepower era my dad has told me about, and the whole king of the hill era we went through with truck engines several years ago. I am with you keith if your camper is that fricking big that you are out of power to pull it in you're pick-up its time to buy a bigger rig. Perhaps you should be looking in the class 7 or 8 truck region. . . . My personal 6.0 is 325 and 560 as shipped from ford and I have plenty of power to pull the fifth wheel horse trailers and gooseneck flat beds I use, even if they are overloaded a little( but that never happens. . .) I wouldnt feel safe with the brakes and everything else if I had a big enough trailer to feel underpowered. The problem is that that a lot of people that buy these trucks expect that the truck should acellerate the same empty as it does with 20,000lbs on it. It is a diesel 1 ton 4x4 it wont accelerate like a mustang, if that is what you are looking for buy a mustang. just my two cents on the matter

I built one and it was really easy as mentioned. The hard part is finding the 40 pin harness connector, I am still looking for mine going on 2 years now. You cant buy the connector from ford so you have to salvage one from a vehicle. the engine harness side isnt to tough we have all replaced the engine harness at one time or another, it is the dastardly vehicle side of the connector that is almost impossible to get a hold of.

Keith you are not the only one that has been laughed out of somewhere for the suggestion of using distilled water when servicing cooling systems. When I service the cooling system in my own vehicles I only flush and fill with distilled water. However you cant convince the guys in the office of this, I understand there is a lot of work involved in setting up a part number and location, to store water. Clean water is no different than using clean oil or fuel. But is somewhat hypocritical of us to preach one thing and than do the other because it is cheaper, or pain in the butt to pour water in gallon jugs instead of just turning on the hose. In the cat world we live and breathe contamination control and the importance of clean fluids. In my opinion water in our cooling systems should be no different. I wonder if someone can order the part number over the counter?

I need to wire an inverter into my service truck. I use it to charge my laptop, cordless tool batteries, etc. It is a 1000 watt inverter and I have 4 gauge cables. The inverter is a bit overkill but anyway. I was planning on going straight to the batteries but the style cable ends make it hard to hook a 4 gauge cable to it. Is there a better place to tap into battery power for this purpose? I plan to go through the firewall on the drivers side, because there is a grommet with hole already in it to run the cables out. As always your insights are welcome and appreciated.

Well thanks for all the input guys. She spotted one at my preferred dealership. Hopefully I will get done with work early enough on saturday that we can make the 60 mile drive to check it out in person and maybe go for a drive. I talked to a few people with escapes here and they had no real complaints about them either. It is an 06' with a v6 and 40,000 miles on it. Looks really clean and in good shape from the pics on their website. It has the continental tires on it, but tires are easily replaced I suppose. Who knows maybe they are worn enough we can work them into the deal or something.