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Competition Duramax engine issues

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Competition duramax puts down 1000 hp

GIT-R-DONE said:
Banks who?



Comp, good luck on your new ride. Cant wait to hear the excuses later when Banks isn't at the top of the time slips.



You don't even own a diesel Comp? So many questions, so little for answers.



Who is Banks again?





I can so see that coming... :-laf
 
What color are your pom poms "Yo Hoot"?



Not really meant to be a personal attack, just a question since you seem to be the resident cheerleader. :rolleyes:
 
JFaulkner said:
What color are your pom poms "Yo Hoot"?



Not really meant to be a personal attack, just a question since you seem to be the resident cheerleader. :rolleyes:



Define cheerleader. Please don't tell me I shouldn't be cheering for my team :{



Are you from the Dmax crowd?
 
Yo Hoot said:
Define cheerleader. Please don't tell me I shouldn't be cheering for my team :{



Are you from the Dmax crowd?



No, I'm not part of any team. I do own a Dodge but I didn't try out for the cheerleading squad (I don't look good in a skirt). However I have seen what the Dmax is capable of and I am open minded enough to respect the capabilities of both. You may have had problems with your Dmax, while thousands of others have not. Same goes for the Cummins, mine has been fine but do some searching and you will find out there are plenty of these that have problems also.



As far as truck pulling goes I'd hope the Cummins performs better than most since it's been around longer than most. You need to take into consideration that the Dmax has only been around since 2000. I do believe the Cummins has a slight head start. I'm not saying either one is better, that is a matter of personal opinion, but anyone who pulls or drag races has sat up and taken notice of a few Dmax trucks. (Tomac, Kyle Michael..... ) Nothing wrong with some competition.
 
JFaulkner said:
No, I'm not part of any team. I do own a Dodge but I didn't try out for the cheerleading squad (I don't look good in a skirt). However I have seen what the Dmax is capable of and I am open minded enough to respect the capabilities of both. You may have had problems with your Dmax, while thousands of others have not. Same goes for the Cummins, mine has been fine but do some searching and you will find out there are plenty of these that have problems also.



As far as truck pulling goes I'd hope the Cummins performs better than most since it's been around longer than most. You need to take into consideration that the Dmax has only been around since 2000. I do believe the Cummins has a slight head start. I'm not saying either one is better, that is a matter of personal opinion, but anyone who pulls or drag races has sat up and taken notice of a few Dmax trucks. (Tomac, Kyle Michael..... ) Nothing wrong with some competition.





Understood. I have met most of those guys personally and watched them run. Yea the Dmax is a heck of a contender.



The issue I have with the Dmax is not that it's not capable, it's just a scary diesel IMHO, to own with respect to reliability and the cost of repair whether it be out of pocket or down time. They can be a bit glitchy too. Once my 2001 hit the 75,000 mile mark I didn't have the cujoons to risk going into the no warranty period. Then they started the engine changes... only two years into it. I guess that's a good thing but it brings up a whole new set of issues everytime they do that. Yea the Cummins is going through similar changing with power and emissions. For some reason I trust Cummins to be able to pull it off more so than International or Isuzu. Cummins has proven themselves over the long term. Isuzu has not in a five years with respect to the Dmax. International is out of control.



The guys running their trucks hard in the pulls or on the track are way out of my league I will admit. I never pretended to know or do what they do nor can I afford it. My hats off to ALL who quest to find the limits of these trucks. It's fascinating to hear everytime another record is set.



The bad part is they get into the realm of money is no object which turns them into NFL football teams and we turn into cheerleaders at times. I don't play Professional Football but I sure have my opinions on it.
 
Yo Hoot said:
The guys running their trucks hard in the pulls or on the track are way out of my league I will admit. I never pretended to know or do what they do nor can I afford it. My hats off to ALL who quest to find the limits of these trucks. It's fascinating to hear everytime another record is set.



So you read a lot, huh?
 
nwpadmax said:
So you read a lot, huh?



Wise guy, looking at all of the pics in my signature and the trucks I've owned and mods I've done, I at least have some hands on experience. I've been to Thunder in Muncie, IRP, and many local events. I do read. I get diesel publications and I read a lot on line. Reading is good for you. Try it sometime.



I actually own a diesel pickup and have since the early 90's.



Now we are on the edge of personal attack -vs- truck banter. I'm posting an opinion about trucks, you post an opinion about me.



When you can't come back on the truck talk, you hit me on a personal level.

So what's up with the Duramax pistons? Is it a weak piston or tuning? I see it as too much stress in a compact rotating assy. Compression kills :-laf One slip and kaboom.





04 2500 4x4, QC SB SLT, 305/555, 48RE H2 Wheels, Toyo OC M/T's, Kore, Gutted Intake Tube/Silencer Ring AWOL, 5" RIP Straight Pipe 6" SS TIP, Mag-Hytec, K3LA Loco Horn

DURAMAX FOR SNAX



04 DODGE PICS AND INFO

01 GMC DMAX/ALLY
 
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Yo Hoot said:
...



For some reason I trust Cummins to be able to pull it off more so than International or Isuzu. Cummins has proven themselves over the long term. Isuzu has not in a five years with respect to the Dmax. International is out of control.



...





It helps the reassurances that Cummins has had the EGR and what not stuff in an ISX for many years already. It's like the little 5. 9 ( and now the little 6. 7) gets all the old hand-me-downs that already work.



Not to mention the 5. 9/6. 7 it self is not only in dodges. Short of a few kodiacs and LCF, were are the other installs of the dirtymax?
 
Timbeaux38 said:
You see, this is a perfect example of ribbing taken right up to the line, but not over. All responses I can use would no doubt cross said line as they would make refrence to Neal's family (i. e. Mom, wife, dog, etc) Good Job Neal. You beat me to the line. And fore the record, I asked my Mom, and she told me she really means it :-laf



Mom's dead, ain't married, don't got a dog, don't live in a trailer, no trains or truck stops nearby, the law ain't lookin' fer me, and my truck ain't broke down yet. Ain't no country or blues songs in *my* life. And, technically, those topics cain't cross the line.



I beat you *off* the line. Reaction time is important, even in banter. :) The winner of this particular 1/4 mile mud drag remains to be seen.



You really had to ask your Mom? Oh ye of little faith. Show me a mom who don't think her kid is better lookin', and I'll be lookin' at someone taken over by an alien. :D :D
 
Yo Hoot said:
Wise guy, looking at all of the pics in my signature and the trucks I've owned and mods I've done, I at least have some hands on experience. I've been to Thunder in Muncie, IRP, and many local events. I do read. I get diesel publications and I read a lot on line. Reading is good for you. Try it sometime.



I actually own a diesel pickup and have since the early 90's.



Now we are on the edge of personal attack -vs- truck banter. I'm posting an opinion about trucks, you post an opinion about me.



When you can't come back on the truck talk, you hit me on a personal level.

So what's up with the Duramax pistons? Is it a weak piston or tuning? I see it as too much stress in a compact rotating assy. Compression kills :-laf One slip and kaboom.



My, aren't we sensitive?



I can assure you that I'm well read also, except I read stuff that one can actually learn something from. You should try that sometime. Put yourself on a diet from marketing jibba jabba and the internet for a month, and maybe, just maybe, your thinking will clear. Perhaps you could make a new years' resolution that you'll put the pompons down and start thinking rationally.



Case in point: your poor understanding of the Dmax piston issue. Your explanation has no fact or technical basis to it whatsoever, and furthermore is completely wrong. If you'd dig a little deeper past your biases, it's possible that you could figure out what happened there, but that's a kinda iffy proposition for you.



I about fall out of my chair laughing at your comments in a competition forum while you have nothing to do with any kind of competition. Why is that relevant to our debate, you ask? Because no one in this section of the forum gives a rat's arse about warranty concerns (see your long diatribe above). Everyone here who's serious about pulling or dragging is their own warranty station, period. So take that argument back out to the "general diesel" section and fire away with the marketing hype and all the things that are "proven," blah blah, blah. The Dmax is "scary" to own? OMG! Run for the hills! I'm Scary!



Y'know, I would willingly take a beating about my Dmax from Kent Crowder, the Haisleys, Jeremy Straley, Sleddy, and guys like that, because they at least have a pulpit to preach from, from actual competition experience. And you... . have your mags and web forums. Bloviating isn't a sport. Pulling or drag racing are sports.



[Speaking of which, how are you keeping up with the Dmax piston discussion when you're supposedly banned from that site, for excessive bloviation?]



Want to settle this like men? Put your truck up against mine in the DP challenge next year.
 
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nwpadmax said:
... pompons ...



Nice to see *someone* knows the correct term. And the corrent spelling (insert oblique reference to Blue Meanie's spelling thread from somewhere). :D



Can we tone down the vitriol a couple notches? At the least y'all could put a few smilies in yer posts! :)



Back on topic, it would seem the pistons cracked before they melted. But there is still no reasonably definitive answer as to *why* they broke. Yet. That thread is one of the best discussions about inadvertent R&D that I've seen anywhere. It's the kind of information flow that really advances diesel motorsports.



Hmmm. I think I may have coined a new term. For example, Mr. Straley didn't 'window his block'. He was actually engaged in 'inadvertent R&D'. :D OK, so it's an egghead term, not a sled puller term.
 
You better be heavily armed if your gonna get into the battle of the wits with NWPADMAX!! There are other DMAX guys that can only respond in incomplete sentences. I am still looking bloviating up in the dictionary. :) Well google worked http://www.thefreedictionary.com/bloviating. :) My guess wasn't too far off. I don't know about settling it like real mean is behind the wheel of a truck. I guess if they are personal truck attacks they should be settled inside the truck, I if they are personal attacks they should be settled in a more old fashioned manner. NW did you fill out the application for the east coast challenge for next year?



Everyone needs to remember have a happy holiday!!!
 
"Vitriol," now there's a good one I haven't heard in a while!



Yeah, you're right, I should probably lay off Toot for a while. It's almost Christmas... . it'll be my present to him :)



OK, back on topic:



The pistons in Rick's truck are pretty much agreed to have been overheated. Why that happened, we don't know. He ran a 65 hp Predator tune, but he says he towed heavy, and the engine did have 300k on it. It would look as if he lost the oil cooling to the pistons, but that's not clear. Mahle's conclusion is that the piston cracked and and shortly thereafter the fuel jet melted through.



Now, Kieth's twin-turboed Dmax is a whole different matter. We're waiting on the final story to be told, but with what I know about the situation, material strength is not the root cause. There were other contributing factors that point in a totally different direction.
 
fest3er said:
Hmmm. I think I may have coined a new term. For example, Mr. Straley didn't 'window his block'. He was actually engaged in 'inadvertent R&D'. :D OK, so it's an egghead term, not a sled puller term.



In the software world, they call them "unexpected features. "



So, at 7710 rpm, Jeremy's truck went into "pre-rebuild self-cleaning mode. "



:-laf
 
MTomac said:
I got $100 on any Duramax against Hoot's Cummins in any dyno, pulling, racing, ect. competition.



I can tell you what I got right now Mike. My last dyno was 423/960. TST PowerMaxCR set on 5/5. No other mods except straight pipe and cleared out intake. Without a trans upgrade and almost 50,000 miles on the stock trans I'd be leary of doing much higher on the TST at full throttle loaded.



I've already layed away a few Dmaxes on the dyno including my old one.

I'll send you my address for the check.



So maybe I'm stupid and don't know the exact causes of piston and block failures on beat up Duramaxes. I also don't know the exact causes of injector failures or headgasket failures on Dmaxes. Eric is not short on work that's for sure. Does anybody know the causes? At least with the Cummins there usually is a simple explanation... . KDP... Killer Dowel Pin... . dowel pin falls out taking out geartrain. Block crack... . bad casting (53 Block) etc.



nwpadmax, OK I'm in the wrong forum and I'm BS'n out of my league. I apologize.

I really don't give a rats a$s though that you don't like it. But I'll apologize anyway for getting you upset.



Anyway... . I'm reading here... . ;) and it seems there is more than one reason Dmax pistons have failed. Too much fuel, too much timing, too much boost, or not enough piston. Which is it? All of the above? Cylinder temps get too high for too long? ... the old egt thing? Pistons overheating/melting could be a clue :) :) :) :) :) :) :) Energy is heat. The pistons are failing because they can't take the heat. OK control the heat... no wait. less power... add heat... need more cooling... . got that... less power... need more heat...



There is a point of power level that the pistons and other parts for that matter simply can't handle. We are all well aware of that. I think diesels are a little harder on the piston than gassers. I could be wrong. No wonder they cool them with oil. At some point the oil simply cannot remove the heat fast enough. On top of that you're superheating the oil. Maybe the Dmax design from an overall standpoint, with respect to 600-700hp simply doesn't cut the mustard. Hows that for technically speaking?



All I was saying earlier in the thread is I believe the much taller piston in the Cummins is a better design for diesels and from a starting point for higher power levels, what more could you ask for? Add the stouter rods and overall stouter design and you have one heck of a stock motor to start with. Didn't they recently break into the 7's with the Cummins? But yea the higher rpm capabilities of the Dmax are more appealing in some respects.



I don't have enough free cash to do a whole lot with my stuff but just because somebody throws money at something does that make them experts?

BTW I in no way claim to be an expert in any way. But on this forum/website we can talk freely about Dmax issues without the whole friggin site hammern down on you. It's a joke over there when somebody honestly tells it like it is.



I must say it's good reading over there. ;) You have the superknowledgable with the years of experience and high tech tools. Than you have the "lets try this" techs who just see what breaks and looks at the signs to determine what the cause was. As was said, there is no tool available in the crazy world that can really show you what's happening.



You can look at a design and compare it to another and get a feel for what's going to hold up better, as long as the designs are sound to begin with. They use the latest and greatest simulation and FEA tools that most of us don't have access to or the wherewithal to use. Apparently Isuzu ran their anaysis which took 4 years :-laf to run before they discovered the block weakness. From what I gather from READING the high power postings is its in a try it and see mode right now and a lot of speculation. Think about the Cummins design and it's heritage and think about the Duramax design and it's heritage. Cummins purposely built a 350,000 mile diesel. Dmax set's it at 200,000. Why the big difference? RPM related? Seriously... not to be smart. Why the 200,000 mile rating? Wouldn't you want to present the best you can do? What the hell good is 365hp stock? The BS hp/marketing kills me.



Notice Ford is using the new 6. 7 Cummins in the 2008 650/750 med duty trucks? Go figure.





It's all banter... hope I didn't get personal with anyone
 
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Gawd, Hoot, you kill me with your random illogical thought!



Ok, here's an example of typical Hootthink:



1) Long time ago Cummins casts a bad block that splits down the side;

2) Cummins institutes changes to correct the problem.

3) Cummins is the greatest in all the earth.



Now, let's look at the flip side:



1) Dmax starts out making the LB7 block

2) Stock engines work fine, one HiPo example shows up on the DP with broken mains;

3) Much later we find that the cam gear pin shearing is probably the culprit.

4) In '04 GM beefs up the block a bit anyway.

5) The toughest Dmaxes in the country are typically the LB7 "weak blocks" [in Hoot's words].

6) Examples of broken blocks due to casting weakness are nonexistant.

7) Dmax sucks anyway.



They're the same thing. What's the difference?



Please point out examples of broken Dmax blocks where the block itself is to blame.



I don't give a rat's arse what things are "rated" at. That's all just meaningless mumbo jumbo about stock trucks, not competition pieces. I'm sure Kent Crowder's truck gets rebuilt a bit sooner than 300k mi. :-laf



And your understanding of the piston issue is still unbelievably superficial.



If ONE Dmax (Rick's truck) burns pistons, and 99. 9% of all other trucks run at even higher horsepower levels are just fine, then do you pronounce the pistons "junk"? No! You go looking for a special cause. Something else was wrong in that motor. Will they find it? I hope so.



Your immediately reaction is to claim the design is poor or limits are being exceeded, because that's all you want to hear.



I'm not taking anything personally, and I'm not upset. I'm just poking holes in your arguments, because they're baseless.
 
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Yes my understanding of the piston issue is superficial. The overall engine design isn't poor in my opinion. It's a good motor/trans combo. The truck itself is probably the best in it's class for the majority of owners that chose them. I loved mine until it got scary :p



Everybody says the Cummins had a head start. It sure did.



Will we be seeing the Dmax in more industrial applications in the future? To me that's a sign of an industrial diesel. I was hoping the Dmax would have matured to that level. Unfortunately it and the Ford offerings don't seem to be headed that direction.



Why would Ford use Cummins in the new med duties?
 
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Man... . can't beleive I missed this one! Wonder how much popcorn (I am stealing a diesel place term) was consumed over this topic. Probably should get more poppin!
 
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