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What have you done to your 5 ton this week?

Bill Nutting

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Ahhhh I almost blew my engine by accident but the NHC250 seems tough. First I tightened the thread on the coolant reservoir cap, which is what probably saved me from blowing the head gasket.

Since I used to make special race fuel mixtures with my bike when I raced a little bit back in the days, I proceeded to see what worked or did not in the NHC. It seemed to run smoother on oil and start better with marvel and tranny fluid. So, I thought, what about some aircraft 5W level grade turbine oil?

Big Mistake.

This stuff is synthetic and had a purplish color, and it does NOT combust. It is more like hydraulic fluid. Result is that I did not notice that I my engine was almost hydrolocking. I am going over a bridge uphill and man was the truck going, she was like accelerating whereas before she would just slow down to 35 mph struggling. I think that the higher compression resulting gave it a few horsepowers.

Then I stop at a kerosene station to fill her up and it is when I started sweating balls. I cranked her back up and she went half a crank and stoped cranking, completely locked in. Once I let go of the start switch she all of a sudden cranked over and started with just one that one crank. I assume some of the cylinder blow by space might have saved it from complete lock in. The exhaust gave out this strange and possibly toxic wettish mist too. Yikes.

Since I added kerosene mixed with some Howes lubricant at the station, I did not have a repeat of that half crank once I got back home. I had coolant leaking out my water pump though but nothing indicating the gasket was blown since then. I gave been checking the oil for 2 weeks and no water nor overfill signs there and she is back to her old ways since then. The leak at the fuel pump shaft stopped too. I might change it, though.

In any case, I found a way to boost the engine compression accidentally, albeit at the risk of blowing my engine. I think I put 3 quarts of that turbine oil for about 10-15 gals of diesel. I changed the fuel filter since then.
STOP IT! You have a great engine. It runs on diesel fuel… Very simple. It’s not a hot rod. It’s a truck designed to get you just about anywhere, just not fast. I use some lubpricity additives designed for Diesel engines and used by major trucking companies. These engines should last for a million miles, but not if you feed them something besides diesel. If going 50 MPH and climbing up hills in lower gears at lower speeds doesn’t suit you, perhaps you have the wrong vehicle…
 

fuzzytoaster

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I had a customer call and ask for a demonstration of what an M931A2 can do this week, he wanted to move a building. I asked for details and he's in the premade housing market for hunting lodges and game ranches. We hooked the tractor up to their specialized hydraulic sled and pulled the 90,000 lb load up a gravel road on a hill. One of the company truckers wouldn't attempt to drive up the hill at all in any vehicle so we grabbed the other driver and I coached him through it. I rode shotgun and filmed when I wasn't watching the road. Low range, 1-1, foot heavy and watching the RPM's (1500-1600) and temp gauge.


The winding path (wish I had a better picture) was compact rock with soft shoulders. We had to swing wide to clear the tightest turn before the incline was at its steepest angle. The right rear tires began to rut in the loose pack rock so we opted to get a small dozer to give us a tug. We stayed chained as not to rut out the road any more than we had to. All in all she did the job at 2-3 mph and could have done it completely unassisted had the road angle been wide enough.

At the top of the hill we positioned the truck and swapped back to their road rig for the wet kit to drop the building. They had 3 more sections to go that day and they bought the truck on the spot. I was told by the VP that it was their steepest and highest climb to date in the history of the company.

 

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Mullaney

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SCM35A2

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Raised my bed up to give the 16.00s a little more clearance. Gonna give the wood a couple weeks to dry before I paint it.

Then I wanted to drive it and it wouldn’t start. Narrowed it down to the pcb and took it apart to find this mess. The solenoids have a 2018 date on them so this happened in 3 years. Replaced both solenoids and cleaned everything up.
Was curious on what the spces-(length/width/height) of the wood that you used to raise your bed floor is?? Thanks
 

Mullaney

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Okay, so it is pretty sad but my accomplishment for the week for my 5-Ton was to open the back door and look outside. I walked out around the truck one time, opened each door and looked in, then came back inside to enjoy the air conditioning.

Sad, but cooler weather is coming soon.
 
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fuzzytoaster

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IMG_20210829_171719.jpg
I had a friend come over this weekend and twisted my arm :roll: to turn some wrenches. I felt like taking some personal time and fiddle with the M757 to see if she would breathe fire. She has the rare LDS-2 so there's some funky modifications involved but at her core she's still a multifuel. We pulled the engine and valve covers just to take a peek at the rockers. The two center rockers were fairly rusted but they were also near the fording valve (vent on the LDT) and I assume moisture worked its way back into the system and got to them.

I pulled the dipstick, which the handle was broken, to show it was overfull. I went 100% precaution with this truck and drained the crankcase. I got a gallon of water and 3 gallons of oil so that only confirmed the previous finds. I let it dry and sprayed out any clots with brake cleaner. The magnetic pan plugs were doing their job and looked like they collected the initial break in shavings of the engine. The speedo shows 1016 miles so it may still be the original oil change. :ROFLMAO:

The fuel tanks were dry and so was the tranny. I didn't plan to drive the truck today so the t-case and axles haven't been inspected. I replaced the oil filters and filled the engine and tranny with 10w to push any crud out of the system. I expect to do another service shortly after that too just to be safe. Immediately after filling the tranny I spotted a class III leak coming from the rear of the Allison 200 and it was coming from the filter cover. I pulled the truck forward with my M10 and found the retaining bar over the cover was loose. In fact it was so loose when I applied pressure to unbolt one side the bar snapped in half like gingerbread. I'm hoping that was the cause of the leak so I just made the best of a bad situation and let it drain any fluid out and hope it cleaned out any residue or moisture.

I checked the linkages and usual suspects as we all do. There is no fuel shut off lever but rather a push button that I'm assuming is attached to a solenoid on the IP that was unplugged. I reattached but really to what end? The button was seized so we planned for a run away situation regardless and I kept my pocketknife ready to cut the main injector line and bail out of the truck if it went critical. The lines are all soft like wet noodles and need to be replaced so it wasn't that much an issue and we had a board ready to block the intake too.

We did some electrical tests which gave us low air buzzer and voltage read outs. Even on the first crank the IP was pushing fuel to the injectors and self identifying a leak along the way. We gave her a little starting fluid to make sure she has compression in hopes she would take off on her own but no luck. We have a fuel supply issue possibly related to many things: bad fuel filters, in tank fuel pump in-op, possible bad fuel lines, etc. It will take a full overhaul to get it sorted out. Even cranking she was still drawing fuel from a filter likely behind the cab and she smoked at the stack but no fire. Ugggghh.. anticipation!

I didn't want to push her too hard. I know I'm working with history and thrilled to have this unique beast in my motorpool so I'll give her time and she will come around. I made a thread looking for a copy of the TM 9-2320-230-34P so I can start tracking down parts. It's a needle in a hay stack but knowing how all MVs of this era were made of similar components there will be cross overs. Heck, the generator (yes generator) is the 100 amp unit from the Mutt with radio upgrade kit. Who'da thunk it?

 

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Crf450x

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Was curious on what the spces-(length/width/height) of the wood that you used to raise your bed floor is?? Thanks
I bought 4x4x16s. I think they wound up being around 13’ long. The stock boards were 1” tall so this raised it 2.5”. There are 5 bolts on each side that hold the boards to the bed and 3 indentions in the bottom of each one to clear carriage bolts going down through the frame. I just laid the stock ones on top to mark them for cutting then drilled down through them. I meant to take a picture of that but I forgot.
 

SCM35A2

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I bought 4x4x16s. I think they wound up being around 13’ long. The stock boards were 1” tall so this raised it 2.5”. There are 5 bolts on each side that hold the boards to the bed and 3 indentions in the bottom of each one to clear carriage bolts going down through the frame. I just laid the stock ones on top to mark them for cutting then drilled down through them. I meant to take a picture of that but I forgot.
Thank you for the info!
 

Mullaney

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They said it was a 2015 dated battery and they weren't surprised that it wouldn't charge above 10.71 volts. One of the cells went bad they said.
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Pretty good life span for a battery...
Still, spending that money isn't as much fun as new lights or new seats or things that you see every day.

I ended up with 4 new batteries in my M1088 and that wasn't much fun.
At least with yours, the battery got sick. Mine were stolen and I still grouse about that almost 9 months later...
 

eric67camino

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Pretty good life span for a battery...
Still, spending that money isn't as much fun as new lights or new seats or things that you see every day.

I ended up with 4 new batteries in my M1088 and that wasn't much fun.
At least with yours, the battery got sick. Mine were stolen and I still grouse about that almost 9 months later...
I feel your pain. I loaned out my batteries to help a friend get a vehicle home. They kept them for a couple months, and when I finally got them back,, they had left the key on and ran them dead. Killed a cell in one. Fortunately I only had to buy two. That was months ago and I'm still kind of mad about it.
 
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