Question for Dodge Cummins truck owners

[jyoutz]

I have a 99 Dodge with a Cummins. I installed an exhaust temperature gauge to guide me for shutdown. I shutdown once the EGT gauge is 350 deg or less. What I have found is that 1 minute of idling is all it takes for the temp to reach 350. If I'm towing a heavy trailer at freeway speeds -maybe another minute. So what this tells me is the excessive idling for cooldown is exactly that -excessive. I'm sure that those with an aftermarket performance chip may require a little more time. But still, there appears to be no mechanical reason for the 10 minute+ idling that lots of folks like to do.

 

[Moon]

A couple thoughts on this. As said earlier in this thread, up to 5 minutes is okay. Many of the ones you see idleing believe they will be back within 5 and save the wear and tear of stopping and restarting the engine. I will keep mine running as long as I'm with the vehicle and it will be approx 5 mins or less before we're driving again. But if leaving it at a store or getting gas, I turn off. I have to turn off at drive thru's ...older Ford dually 1 ton 7.3 and it's loud!

 

[RedDog]

<font color="blue">Or some "immigrant" who needs a front clip or a set of hubcaps. </font>


/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif I like that. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

RedDog

 

[_RaT_]

No, no Robert, say it is not so. A loud Harley around here anymore on the Auburn/Folsom corridor is probably in more danger of vigilante justice then having a run in with another vehicle. The "loud pipes saves lives" cliche may have to be replaced with "loud pipes saves lives but a bullet in the head kills you dead" /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif Actually, I have never heard of this happening but it would not suprise me if someone starts taking shots at the loud bikes running Auburn/Folsom on the weekends. Problem is I guess, 50 year old plus yuppie types are transforming into Hells Angel wantabe's including the noise, the apparel and the occassional itch on back. The shear numbers have made it a problem. Fortunately I do not live close enough to it that it is a problem.

 

[Moon]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( Problem is I guess, 50 year old plus yuppie types are transforming into Hells Angel wantabe's including the noise, the apparel and the occassional itch on back. )</font>

Your right on, I guess this is happening all over. Just last Tuesday (June 21st 05) there was an accident here involving 3 riders. A car stopped to turn and the car behind it stopped but one of the 3 bikers could not stop in time. He hit one of the other bikes and then the stopped car. The driver of the bike was thrown and killed on impact. The shocking part to me was he was 72 years old.

 

[Bird]

Moon, back in the mid- and late 80s, I used to occasionally meet with a group of bikers in a small town about 40 miles south of Dallas. Not really a "club"; just that anyone who wanted to could show up in the front of the bank at 8 a.m. on Saturday (bank closed, of course) and about 8:15 a.m., they'd decide where they were going to ride to for breakfast; sometimes within 10 or 15 miles; sometimes 40 or 50 miles. I was only in my late 40s at the time and twice someone showed up younger than me. Some had their wives with them; some did not, but there was one couple that was always there. He was a tall, skinny ventrolquist, 79 years old, and his wife was a little bitty thing, 81 years old. They rode an older model Honda Goldwing. Another guy, whose wife wouldn't get on a motorcycle, was a retired doctor and if I remember right, he was 75.

And in '85, a fellow I used to work with, and his wife, went to Alaska (and back, of course) from Dallas on their Goldwing. He had his 65th birthday in Alaska on that trip.

The Honda dealer I bought my '85 Aspencade from told he that he sold most of the Goldwings to people who were over the age of 50 and who had never ridden a motorcycle before.

 

[Egon]

<font class="small">Code:</font><hr /><pre> 50 year old plus yuppie types are transforming into Hells Angel wantabe's including the noise, the apparel and the occassional itch on back.

They may be trying but don't have the right bikes and don't know the proper riding formation.

Egon

 

[RobertN]

My exhaust is stock. My old mufflers got yellowed, so I put new tips on. Mine is an '84 though; they had freer flowing mufflers back then. When my wife got her '93, she put the same early muffer on. Her bike was soooo choked up with the standard factory tips.

Mufflers are a funny thing. Single and twin cylinder bikes, or any other motor, like to breath. But, if you want to breath, and open the exhaust up a bit, they get louder than 4, 6, or 8 cylinder motors. The exhaust impulses do not work the same through the muffler. If you put a high-flow muffler on a 4 cylinder bike, they do not get as loud as a two cylinder, whether that is Harley, Yamaha, Kawasaki Vulcan ect.

If you took a Honda XR500 Street/dirt bike, and wanted to make it run better, you could open up the exhaust. But... It will get really loud, compared to opnening up a 4-cylinder 500cc bike.

No matter the vehicle though, it will not run very much better just by messing with the exhaust. Unless a balanced package of intake, cam, exhaust is used, it will just be a loud vehicle...

 

[Cityboyfarmer]

OK, we started out discussing the propensity of Dodge Cummins owners to excessively idle their engines in public and wound up talking about Harley's. Hmmm....I see the connection. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif So to summarize the discussion, Dodge Cummins folks idle excessively for the following reasons:

1. "Hey! Look at me! I'm driving the Harley-Davidson of diesels! /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

2. It is easier to jump Powerstrokes with the Cummins running. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

3. "Loud diesels saves lives"! /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

4. Don't want to turn heat/AC off.

5. Prolong engine life.

6. Items 1-4 above while claiming # 5. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[sweettractors]

<font color="blue"> Is there a mechanical reason for this, or do you Cummins folks just think that loud Cummins just sounds cool? </font>

I figure the Starter motor, Bendix, Solnoid, Flywheel gear and Batteries just have "X" number of starts in them from day one, when they were new. I have found that applies to most tractors/trucks. I instruct my employees to never shut down a diesel loader tractor or truck, until the task is finished--Ken Sweet