Diesel Maintenance after 100k miles?

[Markk]

Thinking of upgrading my truck to a 2500 or 3500 GM 6.6 diesel. I’ve owned many GM 1500 series gas and know that maintenance schedule well.

To make the upgrade more affordable I’m considering buying 2 year old models with 80k-130k miles on them.

What parts would you expect to need refreshing at this short time schedule, however higher mileage? For gas I’d be checking spark plugs, coil packs, manifold gaskets and brakes. What wears on the diesels? Is the turbo suspect at the 100k mark?

 

[mark_m]

My in laws have several of these 6.6 3500 and 2500 trucks, similar miles. They’re bulletproof as long as emissions systems aren’t acting up.

 

[Babin Farms]

Emissions repairs can cost thousands to repair/replace. More sensors going bad sending truck into “limp mode”. Drove diesels for 20 yrs and went back to gas because I was tired of dealing with emissions related problems
Just my .02

 

[J-RAD]

I own a '11 Sierra 2500HD with the 6.6 and 77k miles. My ERG cooler bypass valve started throwing a error at 40k miles on the truck. The dealer wanted 2k to fix it just 2 months out of warranty. I did a full delete of the emissions garbage instead. More power, better mileage, no more DEF. It was awesome for 4 years... and then they decided to add emissions testing back in my county this year. I just spent 2K putting it back together.

Funny thing is, I still have the ERG problem. However, the guys putting it back together determined that it was only caused my the valve opening late. They went in and changed the timing the sensor reads by .5 seconds in the coding and no more problem... for now.

I'm not sure how much they've improved the reliability of the systems over the past few years. My buddy had his stuff replaced under warranty in his '16 at 20k.

I'm now of the mindset that I don't want to own a diesel that's not still under factory warranty. My extended warranty excludes emissions systems.

 

[Dixie Highway]

My opinion on this subject, not that it’s worth anything, is that if you don’t meet the criteria for needing a diesel then you probably don’t want the added fuel and maintenance costs. My criteria are:

1. Driving 50,000 miles per year
2. Those miles are done while loaded to either 50% of the trucks payload or towing 50% of its rated capacity.
3. The items you are hauling/towing demand the higher capacities of a diesel.

Now, this is America and we are free to do what we want. Personally, I drive 55,000 miles per year in a gas F150. My fuel is usually cheaper than diesel, my oil changes are 1/3 the price of diesel oil changes, and my truck will embarrass a lot of “sporty” cars 0-60. I get about 11 mpg towing my boat (almost 5,000# ready for the water) which for me is about 7% of my total miles per year, the rest I do about 15 city, 19 highway. Oh, and up here in the frozen north I can leave it sit out at -40 degrees and it’ll start without being plugged in.

 

[Liftr]

I think I’ve said this before in another thread.

“Don’t buy a diesel for the savings. Buy a diesel for its capability.”

I can’t help with your actual question, as my newest diesel is 2007. No DEF, DPF, EGR, no nothing.
I just buy fuel, and mash on the smoke pedal.

 

[Markk]

I own a '11 Sierra 2500HD with the 6.6 and 77k miles. My ERG cooler bypass valve started throwing a error at 40k miles on the truck. The dealer wanted 2k to fix it just 2 months out of warranty. I did a full delete of the emissions garbage instead. More power, better mileage, no more DEF. It was awesome for 4 years... and then they decided to add emissions testing back in my county this year. I just spent 2K putting it back together.

Funny thing is, I still have the ERG problem. However, the guys putting it back together determined that it was only caused my the valve opening late. They went in and changed the timing the sensor reads by .5 seconds in the coding and no more problem... for now.

I'm not sure how much they've improved the reliability of the systems over the past few years. My buddy had his stuff replaced under warranty in his '16 at 20k.

I'm now of the mindset that I don't want to own a diesel that's not still under factory warranty. My extended warranty excludes emissions systems.

Will you give me more detail on a “delete”. I keep hearing it mentioned.

When doing a delete are you removing all DEF regeneration equipment? Does it require programming the computer to skip that step?

Is it hard to find a shop to do this work?

We run a lot of Kenworth/Peterbilt equipment for my business. As comparison, the most common fault code we see is with DEF exhaust regeneration.

 

[J-RAD]

Will you give me more detail on a “delete”. I keep hearing it mentioned.

When doing a delete are you removing all DEF regeneration equipment? Does it require programming the computer to skip that step?

Is it hard to find a shop to do this work?

We run a lot of Kenworth/Peterbilt equipment for my business. As comparison, the most common fault code we see is with DEF exhaust regeneration.

I had a buddy whose dad has a muffler shop cut off both the catalytic converter, the diesel particle filter, and staight piped it. It did require having it tuned to delete/bypass the sensors and associated codes. It worked out for me because I just so happened to know a guy who knew a guy. The guy who did it was quite knowledgeable and tuned it so as to give me a good ratio of extra power and milage. It also put out a minimal amount of soot under average driving conditions.

The biggest expense of putting it back to stock stemmed from the manner in which the parts were removed and your sensors were delt with. It cost me more that twice what was estimated to put it back together... the catalytic converter was cut if in a way part of it was cut off and left as a flange to weld the staight pipe to, causing extra labor to get it to seal properly when reinstalling it. I was missing a sensor somewhere somehow ($60)... missing a line from the DEF tank to the particle filter ($100). The biggest expense however stemed from the fact there was DEF left in the tank which crystallized and wrecked the pump and heater coil ($1,100). Had either I or the guy removing the parts been more knowledgable of some of the consequences of the conditions of which things were done it would have been easier and cheaper to have gone back.

One way in which they saved me is with the exhaust gas recirculation cooler bypass valve. The whole reason I did the delete in the first place was due to that valve throwing a code. When out of warranty the dealer wanted $2k to replace it, because it's such a labor intensive repair. I was afraid I'd still end up having to deal with replacing it. Fortunately they were able to determine that the valve was functioning... it was just opening a fraction of a second slow tripping the sensor. They were simply able to change the timing of the sensor to read .5 seconds later and the problem was solved.

I'm rambling on telling a whole story about stuff you never even asked... lol! Sorry. I'm just not convinced these systems are doing any good.