mrwaters

My truck is over maintained I have a maintaince record that is about 4" thick I do all of the Dodge maintaince recomendations and I do all cummins recomendations. I even check the lift pump strainer every other fuel filter change.
I knew about the return fuel line failing (the 6" one behind the fuel filter) but I thought my was fine.
On my 35 mile drive home from work I noticed a heavy diesel smell about five minutes into my drive, I said to myself not me must be someone else and rolled up my window turned on the air.
When I pulled in to my driveway and opened up the door I smelled heavy diesel and couldnt miss the huge puddle under my truck and the trail going out to the street and the diesel dripping off my rear bumper. I knew what it was because I have read every single post on this site and others. But I still opened the hood and started it and saw the fuel spraying out from the return hose behind the fuel filter.
I dropped the fuel filter used 7mm to remove the two hose clamps and pulled the hose off and it was split down the middle from one end to the other. I went to Napa bought two feet of 5/16 fuel hose cut what I needed about 6" and installed took about 5 minutes. Its not that hard just get on a step ladder and reach down in there. I then installed a new fuel filter because I keep 3 on the shelf all the time, primed the system and no problems. I did not use the other expensive fuel hose that I read about, I couldnt find it. I will just change this hose out at every 50K miles the original lasted 185K.
So next time you change your fuel filter change out that return line or you will be changing it after work in the dark like me.
Thanks for reading
Mike

infidel

At least you made it home.
When the return line went out on my 3500 I was over 100 miles from home when I noticed my gauge was reading almost empty. I had left with a full tank. I was 50 miles from the nearest town, luckily there was a farmer out on his tractor with a auxiliary tank in his pickup that sold me 30 gallons of red diesel at on-road price. I had no real choice but to drive to the closest dealer 50 miles away where they replaced the hose for $150. It took about 20 gallons to go those 50 miles netting my worse fuel mileage ever, 2.5 mpgs.

If I were you I'd just skip the 50k hose replacement and buy some good USCG hose that will last the life of the truck from www.fostertruck.com if you can't find it locally. It very apparent just looking at it how much better it is than generic autoparts or stock hose.
I used some Gates fuel hose from Napa on a truck I worked on, it was leaking again in less than a year, last time I tried to skimp on it.
In fact I never replace just the short section of hose anymore but rather run new hose all the way from behind the filter to the tank and abandon the factory lines.
I've had almost as many failed steel lines on top of the bell housing come in as I have failed return lines. They tend to crack where the bolt down strap is welded to the line. Sometimes this happens in the struggle to connect a new hose to the rear part of the steel line.

Your '98 return line is the easiest of the 12 valves to replace, on earlier models the return hose is about 24" long and the rear hose clamp is way down there. You would be lucky to get it done in two hours almost entirely by feel one handed.