Alex Bruene

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I know an ambulance driver, he says when they are transporting a critical patient, they keep the pedal down no matter what. They either get to the hospital or it blows up, then they call another ambulance.

Cummins equipped transit or emergency vehicles will not derate or shut down for any reason.  They'll just go til they die.  Pardon the pun.  Buses won't derate in case it decides to happen on a railway crossing.  I wonder why we don't implement a strategy like that for emergency and/or transit vehicles?

Oh, dear.

I guarantee you that I will not even consider getting the torch out for 0.3. 

I was thinking about changing my avatar.  Then, I changed my mind.

I'm a firm believer that rust modules are one of the great F&I wallet flushes of recent years...  I have always felt that the companies that sell these products rely stongly on recent impovements to the metal and materials we use in manufacturing vehicles to make the general public think their product actually does something...

So, we have a 2010 Escape in our bodyshop, with rust on the fenders, rear quarter dog-legs, roof and hood...  It has a rust module installed since new.  Our bodyshop provided an estimate to the company to properly repair the vehicle with new metal...  I think the estimate was in the $3-4K range.  They authorized us $300 to sand the rust, cheese it and touch up the paint.  Nice!  Money well spent!

 I think they may be regretting selling these policies.

We don't sell Dieselcare, and we usually send people back to the dealer they bought it from...  Unless they're out-of-towners.

Alex, his name isn't Alex is it?

No.  He's not new to the dealership.  Just new to me.  He just graduated from ASSET  .  He's actually alright.  A little cocky.  Reminds me a bit of myself when I was his age.  I've been tasked to whip him in to shape.  The way they do shit around here, he'll probably be on flat-rate by the end of the week.   

It hasn't returned yet.  We wrote the work order last week, as he was at 159,999 km.  I'm kind of glad it isn't here, because I really don't have the time to look at it.  I hope things settle down a little bit, as I'm getting a "new" apprentice-seeing that all of our attempts at advertising to hire a new tech have returned ZERO resumes.

I made up a tool to do them in chassis years ago.  I can do a set in about 4 hours.  You need to remove all the rockers and push rods.  Take a dime, cover it in grease and drop in into the cup before installing the tap.  That will catch all the filings.  There is more than enough room to install them with a hammer. 

I don't know if you can install them with the left engine mount in place.  I remove it for the right side.  There is sufficient access on the left side with out removing any mounts.

A lot of companies around here close down for that week.  Unfortunatlely (fortunately?) one of our biggest fleet clients closes down a few days before Christmas and doesn't reopen until the day after New Year's...  During that time, I get all 30 of their F-550s for front and rear brakes, full maintenance and annual inspections, making it by far my most lucrative stretch of the year...  Then, I take a week off to sleep and hit the bottle.

I had it lucky during my apprenticeship.  The dealership I worked at wanted apprentices to get the best possible experience they could before going on flat rate.  I was kept hourly until well in to the 4th year of my apprenticeship.  I worked a year in front end, a year in transmission and close to 2 years in tune-up until one of the tune-up techs left and his position was offered to me.  I see too many dealerships look at hourly staff as a hit to the bottom line, and have yet to see the kind of techs that came of the system I learned on anywhere else.  It's a shame that apprentices are being rushed on to the floor without having an opportunity to learn the skills they need to survive.  JMHO.

That sucks...  You gotta address the things that are keeping your brain awake and trash them!  When I lock my tool box at night, I leave everything work related with it.  I fall asleep before my head hits the pillow, and sleep until 2 minutes before my alarm is set to go off. 

Perhaps there's more too it though, talk to your Dr.  Get in a sleep study.

Yeah...  What are you doing?

This one certainly has no EGR codes in it.  It is supposed to arrive today or tomorrow... I'll be sure to check the EGR...  Or, just throw one at it...

My beer-fuelled-turkey-farts are sure keeping the family on their toes today!

 

I have a good one on the files right now, too...  I had to replace a steering gear on a 2010 F-250...  I was under $1000 parts and labor (which is our limit for ESP without prior approval)...  I ordered the part, which was backordered...  When the part finally arrived (nearly 2 months), the part number had changed along with the price...  So now, I'm $50 over after removing fluids from the claim and it won't get paid... 

Submit it with the explanation of the part update. It may take a few times to get your point across, but I should go through.

 

That's what we've been trying to do.  It's been sent back 4 times so far. 

I have a guy that with same complaint and same results. He told me the other day that it doesn't more when it is rainy or wet outside.

There is an updated CAC for that issue.  I did that TSB about a year ago on this truck.

I have a good one on the files right now, too...  I had to replace a steering gear on a 2010 F-250...  I was under $1000 parts and labor (which is our limit for ESP without prior approval)...  I ordered the part, which was backordered...  When the part finally arrived (nearly 2 months), the part number had changed along with the price...  So now, I'm $50 over after removing fluids from the claim and it won't get paid... 

Alright, back to my original issue...  Ahh, forget it!

He says it happens more often when not regenerating.  The last time it was here, I ran a manual regeneration after replacing the EGR cooler (which didn't really look like it had an issue once I had it removed).  It smoked like a mofo for about 5-10 minutes then cleared up.  Tail pipe tips are clean.  I'll get hotline involved (again) and likely get no useful answers (again).  Cheers!

I just had a 43 year employee retire (not a diesel guy), but I still have other techs over 60. I'm working to build my techs as best I can, because the writing is on the wall about the work on both sides it takes to build a good technician.

My #2 tech gave his notice to retire a few weeks ago.  His last day is next Tuesday...  So, that will leave me on my own.  I've been trying to get help from my light duty shop, and quite a few of them keep coming back with all sorts of wallet flush estimates and misdiags, it's almost more work for me than if I did all the work myself and slept at the dealership every night.  Thankfully we have one Master Diesel Tech in the light duty shop I can rely on, but he's also a drivability/electrical tech, so he's got enough of his own work to do, let alone find time to help me...

We're trying to convince said retiree to perhaps semi-retire for a month or so, as to give us a bit more time to find a replacement. 

We currently have 16 untouched ROs sitting in waiting...  And the work keeps coming.  I think I'll be finding myself in a pine box someday really soon! 

 

This thread is like a chatroom, 'bout 3 conversations goin' at once.

But the important thing was, I had an onion on my belt. Which was the style at the time.

 

They didn't have white onions because of the war. The only thing you could get was those big yellow ones...

This guy called me today.  He was driving on the highway and it was billowing out smoke for over 5 minutes.  Engine ran fine.  He's bringing it back in to me next week, so I'm trying to get a head start on any possible things to look for.  I have been trying to resolve this issue for over a year now.  I have drivin it home and back on several occasions, at nearly 150km  round trip and have NEVER had it happen to me.  This truck is worked and drivin like it should be.  Sees the highway every day.  Tows large loads.

I have a few customers on the road with 6.4s that smoke from time to time.  Most of these I have never been able to verify.  I have one in particular that blows white smoke, and is about to run out of warranty, and I've never been able to figure it out (or verify it, for that matter), but I know the customer well enough to believe him.  So far, this truck has had a few injectors due to excessive SFTs, and CAC, and last week I threw a horizontal cooler at it because I there was (potentially) some moisture in the EBP tube.  It's not using oil or coolant, but I can't verify if it's growning oil right now because he just had his oil changed elsewhere.

My question is if any of you guys have any experience with these, because of the amount of people I hear complaining about it, somebody has to have seen it...  And, what (if anything) you guys have done to fix these...  Thanks, y'all! 

I have a drawer in my tool box full of them.  I've been cutting them off clocksprings since 1992!