Recently I chose to become a dealer of IPD parts, I had a customer that brought this Peterbilt in for low oil pressure issues. What better time to put the IPD parts to the test. In this post I’ll share my thoughts about this overhaul and using IPD overhaul kits. Plus how can I promote parts that I haven’t personally used?
Do It Right The First Time
By no means am I perfect but, if you are going to get your engine overhauled, make sure its by a reputable person or shop. Unfortunately this customer didn’t do their research, and they ended up paying for it in the end, and that sucks. A few months back I received a phone call from this local trucking company, asking if I had time to look at their truck, (of course i said yes) they started telling me how the engine was loosing oil pressure right after their mechanic overhauled the engine. Shortly after the truck shows up, I look it over and checked a few things, didn’t really find anything wrong so decided to drop oil pan and inspect bottom end. This is where the shenanigans start.
Following Directions Is Key
If you’re not willing to look up and follow proper procedures given by manufactures then you really shouldn’t try perform repairs on vehicles in my opinion especially in depth engine repairs. Once I dropped the oil pan, it wasn’t long until i realized this engine was put together improperly. Red loctite covered the oil pump bolts, oil pump shims installed on only one side of the oil pump, main bearing cap bolts had torque markings that didn’t line up, strong indication that the bottom end wasn’t properly torqued. Right as I was about to call up the customer and tell them what i thought was going on, I noticed oil dripping from the exhaust right behind turbo, so i decided to inspect this mystery too. After removing the turbo, exhaust manifold, and valve cover I found signs of the engine being out of time.
Went ahead and removed the valve cover and found broken injector rocker shaft bolts and an injector that grenaded. Got the front cover for the gear train off and I wasn’t surprised. It appeared as if the previous mechanic tried to time the engine by marking teeth on the cam gears and idler gear. This method does not work on this engine, it will only cause problems as you can tell.
Let’s Get BUSY!!!!
After discussing with the customer what I found, we came to the conclusion that it was best to just start from scratch and overhaul the engine, I suggested using IPD kit and they agreed, YAY!!!! As I finished disassembling the engine , removing the cams, cylinder head, pistons and liners. I placed my first order for the overhaul kit and patiently waited for news from my machine shop. Luckily for the customer no valves were damaged, and there was no need to replace any. After a lot of cleaning and measuring liner protrusion, the parts arrived.
Let’s Talk Parts
I was impressed with the IPD parts packaging, everything was double boxed with some insulation paper to prevent damage during transportation. The piston rings came in very nice individual packaging with labels for what position each ring was to be installed on the piston. They also came with break in instructions as well, the only thing I noticed was they didn’t really specify the orientation of the intermediate compression ring in the instructions. If you don’t pay close attention or don’t have much experience in building engines you could install the compression ring upside down. The pistons and liners appear to be well machined with nice finish, packaged in sealed plastic and coating to prevent rust. The bearings come individually packaged, with thin separation sheet in between the rod bearings to prevent scratching the bearing surface. The Seals and head gasket was nicely packaged in two boxes, all seals have IPD labeled on the outside along with part numbers. Overall the parts are very well constructed, a great alternative to OEM that should last if properly installed.
Alive and running strong
After getting everything installed, torqued properly, valve lash adjusted and refilled with fluids, the engine was ready for start up. It didn’t take much to prime the fuel system and the engine was finally alive and running with oil pressure was holding at 40 psi. Took this Pete for a spin around the block and called the customer to deliver the good news. Im sure the customer will be pleased with this overhaul, I am very grateful that they trusted me to get the job done right. I look forward to doing another rebuild using IPD parts.