Post by Brook Green on Feb 28, 2016 17:28:28 GMT -9
Mike Hanzuk wrote the following for us a while back, I'd like to post it here for posterity, and open the discussion once again. Now that most of us have gone through at least one winter with our diesels, what have we learned? What worked, what didn't, what would you do different? Did your tires work as well as you had hoped? Did your fuel gel up?
Ok guys I have noticed there is a lot of the same recurring questions about winter in AK, fuels additives etc. I am going to just provide general knowledge here and try to make it as un-biased as possible.
SMOKE-Let's start with smoke. As we all know it is starting to get colder. As the temperature drops the air becomes denser. With that said you will see less black smoke and soot from your engine as it will have more air to add to the mix. Also you may notice what seems to be "white smoke" from your exhaust on cold mornings. This is normal, it is steam and if you watch just about every vehicle on the road they do the same thing. It will typically clear up once the vehicle is up to temp and you have been on the road for a bit, but the colder it gets, it may not fully clear up.
A side note to this is on older trucks, the truck may also lope when it first starts for a few minutes until it warms up a little.
FUEL&ADDITIVES-This is a highly debated subject and everyone will have a different answer as to what you should use. There is little research out there and what is out there is not very current so it's hard to say for sure. As most of us know in AK the fuel sucks and the tanks are not properly cared for as they should be. While it is true that the fuel pretty much comes from the same place for the different stations, what is different in the amount of gunk, water, and care there is in those storage tanks. There have been a few local studies rumored to report that Chevron and Shell (mainly Chevron) are the best places to go. Feel free to make your own decision, but what is important that you stick to stations that have high traffic so you know that fuel is not sitting for a long time collecting moisture. Also on a side note for those of you that use Fred Meyer or Safeway rewards cards for fuel, your Fredmeyer one works at shell and Safeway one works at Chevron. Also note that Chevron does use power service as an additive in their fuel.
When it comes to personal use of fuel additives, as stated before there is little research and what is there is fairly out dated. With that said it is the only research we have, and based off of it not all additive is the same. A lot of us on here use and/or sell a product such as Power Up Lubricants, or Opti Lube based on our research showing it is best or one of the best. There are some decent ones readily available at most auto parts stores, grocery stores and gas stations such as Power Service or Standyne. Do some research and choose what you think is best, but remember this... We spend thousands of dollars on our trucks modifying and maintaining them, and as true with anything what's cheapest and easiest to find isn't always the best quality. The most important part though is that you do something to help keep your fuel system clean and lubed because the ULSD we have in the pumps these days is super dry.
Something else to note, the stations put in additives to help with anti gel in the winter. They use kerosene or other various additives to do so. These additives they use lower the BTU's and Cetane of the fuel, which means it doesn't burns as well. This will cause your fuel economy to go down, this is also normal for winter time. Most report 100-150 miles less per tank but this can vary dependent upon truck.
MAINTENANCE-This is another highly debated subject. When it comes to service on our trucks the most important thing is that we are doing regular service and not just oil and air filters. You should be doing your fuel filters, diffs, trannies, t cases, drives shafts and front end/u joints, brake fluid, power steering fluid, coolant. Follow your manufacturer guidelines for intervals, but remember conditions are harsher up here, most service interval charts will have a regular and a severe or harsh environment suggested intervals. Use the harsh environment, if your can't find these then, 50-65% of regular time is about what it should be (for example: if it says fuel filter every 15k then you should do it between 7500-10k). As far as brand, there is no definite answer but we do know is synthetic provides better librication and what works best for one engine may not work the best for another.
Also making sure your battery terminals and connection points are clean and using some type of di-electric grease or anti corrosion gel to make sure you have full powe helps a lot with cold starts or just making sure we get full power or charging when we leave our trucks run in the cold.
FILTRATION-All too often I see guys sticking the biggest free flowing air filters or cheap oil and fuel filters on there trucks. This is a problem. Your factory air filter provides the best filtration and can typically support 500hp, for those of you pushing more power or just really itching to spend the money on a cold air in take S&B and AFE seem to be only slightly less than factory filters for filtration but it is a good idea to use an outerwear. There are a couple others out there such as a Ford AIS that are brand specific but offer excellent filtration. Also stay away from oiled filters, the oil is designed to leak through the filter some, the problem is the fine dirt particles that get trapped in the oil will go through the filter with the oil. For anyone who doesn't believe how fine and abrasive the dirt is in AK I will be happy to provide an oil analysis I had done on a 5.9 cummins stating that they are seeing dirt particle in the oil that are coming through the air filter, that was on a truck with factory filter and changed every 3,000 miles.
When it comes to the other filters on your truck don't use cheap K&N or Fram filters, use either factory or some kind of quality filter such as fleetguard or CAT. Clean fluids and air is very important to keeping our trucks running for a long time.
PLUG IN/WARM UP-It is generally a good practice to plug in your diesel as the temperature starts to get down near 0 or below, with at least a block heater, but an oil heater will help circulate the oil on cold starts. This is by no means necessary (except on some trucks that won't start with out being plugged in once below a certain temp or once you get done below -20 you should plug it in of possible). You absolutely should give your truck at least 5-10 minutes of warm up as it gets cold though. Improper warm ups and going out and romping on it before the engine has had time to warm up can lead to blown head gaskets or other things such as melted pistons in severe cases. If you don't have time to warm it up just remember to be easy on the truck for a few minutes so it can gradually come up to temp.
If anyone one has any questions feel free to post them or if anyone doesn't see something in this post in regards to maintenance or cold weather normalcies feel free to ask and I will edit the post and add it.
Hopefully this helps some of you.
Mike Jr Hanzuk
Ok guys I have noticed there is a lot of the same recurring questions about winter in AK, fuels additives etc. I am going to just provide general knowledge here and try to make it as un-biased as possible.
SMOKE-Let's start with smoke. As we all know it is starting to get colder. As the temperature drops the air becomes denser. With that said you will see less black smoke and soot from your engine as it will have more air to add to the mix. Also you may notice what seems to be "white smoke" from your exhaust on cold mornings. This is normal, it is steam and if you watch just about every vehicle on the road they do the same thing. It will typically clear up once the vehicle is up to temp and you have been on the road for a bit, but the colder it gets, it may not fully clear up.
A side note to this is on older trucks, the truck may also lope when it first starts for a few minutes until it warms up a little.
FUEL&ADDITIVES-This is a highly debated subject and everyone will have a different answer as to what you should use. There is little research out there and what is out there is not very current so it's hard to say for sure. As most of us know in AK the fuel sucks and the tanks are not properly cared for as they should be. While it is true that the fuel pretty much comes from the same place for the different stations, what is different in the amount of gunk, water, and care there is in those storage tanks. There have been a few local studies rumored to report that Chevron and Shell (mainly Chevron) are the best places to go. Feel free to make your own decision, but what is important that you stick to stations that have high traffic so you know that fuel is not sitting for a long time collecting moisture. Also on a side note for those of you that use Fred Meyer or Safeway rewards cards for fuel, your Fredmeyer one works at shell and Safeway one works at Chevron. Also note that Chevron does use power service as an additive in their fuel.
When it comes to personal use of fuel additives, as stated before there is little research and what is there is fairly out dated. With that said it is the only research we have, and based off of it not all additive is the same. A lot of us on here use and/or sell a product such as Power Up Lubricants, or Opti Lube based on our research showing it is best or one of the best. There are some decent ones readily available at most auto parts stores, grocery stores and gas stations such as Power Service or Standyne. Do some research and choose what you think is best, but remember this... We spend thousands of dollars on our trucks modifying and maintaining them, and as true with anything what's cheapest and easiest to find isn't always the best quality. The most important part though is that you do something to help keep your fuel system clean and lubed because the ULSD we have in the pumps these days is super dry.
Something else to note, the stations put in additives to help with anti gel in the winter. They use kerosene or other various additives to do so. These additives they use lower the BTU's and Cetane of the fuel, which means it doesn't burns as well. This will cause your fuel economy to go down, this is also normal for winter time. Most report 100-150 miles less per tank but this can vary dependent upon truck.
MAINTENANCE-This is another highly debated subject. When it comes to service on our trucks the most important thing is that we are doing regular service and not just oil and air filters. You should be doing your fuel filters, diffs, trannies, t cases, drives shafts and front end/u joints, brake fluid, power steering fluid, coolant. Follow your manufacturer guidelines for intervals, but remember conditions are harsher up here, most service interval charts will have a regular and a severe or harsh environment suggested intervals. Use the harsh environment, if your can't find these then, 50-65% of regular time is about what it should be (for example: if it says fuel filter every 15k then you should do it between 7500-10k). As far as brand, there is no definite answer but we do know is synthetic provides better librication and what works best for one engine may not work the best for another.
Also making sure your battery terminals and connection points are clean and using some type of di-electric grease or anti corrosion gel to make sure you have full powe helps a lot with cold starts or just making sure we get full power or charging when we leave our trucks run in the cold.
FILTRATION-All too often I see guys sticking the biggest free flowing air filters or cheap oil and fuel filters on there trucks. This is a problem. Your factory air filter provides the best filtration and can typically support 500hp, for those of you pushing more power or just really itching to spend the money on a cold air in take S&B and AFE seem to be only slightly less than factory filters for filtration but it is a good idea to use an outerwear. There are a couple others out there such as a Ford AIS that are brand specific but offer excellent filtration. Also stay away from oiled filters, the oil is designed to leak through the filter some, the problem is the fine dirt particles that get trapped in the oil will go through the filter with the oil. For anyone who doesn't believe how fine and abrasive the dirt is in AK I will be happy to provide an oil analysis I had done on a 5.9 cummins stating that they are seeing dirt particle in the oil that are coming through the air filter, that was on a truck with factory filter and changed every 3,000 miles.
When it comes to the other filters on your truck don't use cheap K&N or Fram filters, use either factory or some kind of quality filter such as fleetguard or CAT. Clean fluids and air is very important to keeping our trucks running for a long time.
PLUG IN/WARM UP-It is generally a good practice to plug in your diesel as the temperature starts to get down near 0 or below, with at least a block heater, but an oil heater will help circulate the oil on cold starts. This is by no means necessary (except on some trucks that won't start with out being plugged in once below a certain temp or once you get done below -20 you should plug it in of possible). You absolutely should give your truck at least 5-10 minutes of warm up as it gets cold though. Improper warm ups and going out and romping on it before the engine has had time to warm up can lead to blown head gaskets or other things such as melted pistons in severe cases. If you don't have time to warm it up just remember to be easy on the truck for a few minutes so it can gradually come up to temp.
If anyone one has any questions feel free to post them or if anyone doesn't see something in this post in regards to maintenance or cold weather normalcies feel free to ask and I will edit the post and add it.
Hopefully this helps some of you.
Mike Jr Hanzuk
