sheepboy

Ok, it's been "cold", in the teens at night.
I have been plugging in the truck for the engine but the past 2 days I have noticed an odd power fluctuation just after starting the truck.

Yesterday I noticed that after startup (idle in the driveway) my head lights would dim for 2-3 sec then go back to normal for 3-5 sec and it would cycle through this for unknown amount of time as I did not sit there very long then pulling out of the drive and all was fine.

So today I paid more attention to what was going on.
-put key in to run position (battery gauge read just over 12v)
-waited till the glow light went out and started the truck (battery gauge went up to 14v)
-heard a click in the engine, something turning on-not sure what (battery gauge dipped to just over 12v) (head lights dim)
-seconds later the truck clicked again and back up to 14v
It cycled through this a few times and I then set the truck to High idle and all was good.

So.....
1. Should I be concerned?
2. Is this normal?
3. What is turning on/off?


A little back ground...this is my daily driver. 20min in town drive to work. Some stop and go. As its been cold I have been locking out 6th gear. Some mornings/evenings the engine barely gets to 200 for 5-10min. I do remote start/idle before I drive it and when I am picking up the kid at daycare.

Dodgetracker

Its normal. Probably your grid heater turning on and off. Pretty cold where you are so. It will quit after truck warms up some.

Beast2B

hopefully you get a chance to tow heavy once a month, or at least give it a good hour run at highway speeds to keep the DPF cleaned out

cozzo1000

Normal behavior. My truck does the same thing when it's "cold" here in Texas..... of course, we're gonna hit 80 degrees today, just like yesterday....

sheepboy

Beast2B,

In winter....no...the camper does not go out in this weather it gets winterized in October and hopefully back out in May.

I know it not good but not much I can do. I have been lucky this year in that I get a 40min x2 highway drive for the last few weeks so that gets to burn off some of the crap but not enough.

I can say I have never seen the DPF is full but im sure i live in regen for a week at a time.

The 1st tow of spring is going to blow out tons of crap, special since the camper is 15k

DieselBoy20

x3 it's your grid heater, takes a ton of juice to cycle your grid heater while it's warming up, perfectly normal


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sheepboy

good to know, i had a feeling it was ok, but if you don't ask you don't know for sure