I replied in a warranty thread but am trying this for the first time. 2011 2500 SLT 4wd with 8,600 mi. Towed a 2 horse slant trailer with furniture down I-5 and the turbo failed on the grapevine.
Been at the dealers since the 28th of Dec. Engineers from Dodge wanted to see why before repairs were started. Now with no visit the turbo and exhaust plus 5 sensors are being replaced. What should I watch for?
PS the 92 W250 made the trip to retrieve the trailer no problem.

 

Good old 1st gens, gotta love em!

 

Welcome to the forum. Wish it were under better circumstances. Interesting that they are replacing the exhaust system and related sensors. Sounds like the hot side of the turbo had a catastrophic event. What were the symptoms when it failed, ie. awful noise, instant loss of power, CEL, quit running immediately, etc? Sure taking their sweet time to fix it. At least it is under warranty.

 

Sometimes things break. Sometimes you gotta pay for it. This time dodge did. If your leaving it stock for warranty make sure you run it hard to keep the DPF clean and let Dodge fix what (if) breaks.

Welcome to the DTR.

And yeah. 1st gens are awesome.

 

Heard metallic chirping under acceleration and stopped of next offramp. No messages form the "brain". Towed to a dealer on flat bed and it was driven into the service bay. Running fine at idle in service bay when RPMs went up and black smoke out the exhaust. after 30 secs the engine stopped on its own. Crankcase oil out tailpipe. Everyone tells me how tough these 6.7 motors are, well I guess I'm going to find out...

 

Pretty good chance the bearing at the exhaust turbine end of the shaft had some sort of defect from Holset. Very close tolerances there. Two things to keep in mind to keep the new turbo happy:

1. Use the exhaust brake as much as possible. This will help keep carbon from building up on the side of the drum that the variable vanes are attached to.

2. Allow the engine to idle for a short period of time before shutting it down. This will allow the hot section to cool down to where it won't cook the ever present oil that naturally gets through the laberynth seals and onto the back side of the exhaust turbine. This carbon can build up to the point that is will cause the turbo to intermittantly stop spinning at idle. Took me a while to track that one down.

One other thing on the old turbo. Make sure there wasn't any damage to the compressor side of the turbo, as this will send metal into the intercooler. This will require removing and cleaning the intercooler and related tubing.

 

This is why I am still on the fence regarding deletes. How much would this repair cost if it were not covered by the warranty?

 

I'm with you a little Kurt. But I wonder if we are deleted will we get the carbon buildup that seems to be the cause of these listed failures. I'm not deleted yet - I want a few more miles on first. But that day will come soon.

Seems like everything we CAN do to help our trucks to last will void the warranty and potentially get us fined. Heard about a full delete guy being fined in commifornia two weeks ago. What are we coming to?

 

On the other side, this may not have happened if the truck was deleted. There wouldn't be the carbon to begin with, (perhaps it was a piece of "coal" that found it's way through the engine and out the exhaust that chipped a turbine blade) the oil would stay clean and you could run a good synthetic oil without it getting fuel dilution. You would have gauges to monitor EGT and other stuff and the exhaust would be free of O2 and pressure sensors, DPF and NOX filters, that along with no regen would allow it to run cooler.
I have no idea why a standard turbocharged diesel does not have an EGT indication.
Sorry to hear of your problems and hope you get the truck back soon.

 

Factory crankcase venting of hot oil vapor mixed with re-combusted exhaust waste plus chunks of coal, as mentioned earlier, causing carbon buildup, chipped VGT blades and reduced service life of the turbo. Maybe the Engineers from Cummins already knew why it failed. Hope you get it back soon.

 

That is a terrible story and I am sorry that your new truck is giving you problems. Who knows what could have happened.

I think it is hit or miss.