So I was on my way to visit Scotttahoe for a day of wrenching and AE analyzing, and Stinky had a bad case of the romps at fire-up. My thoughts went "well... this is a good day to catch it, because the weather is nice and wrenching is already on the schedule". I have the AIH relay just sitting there in reserve, so I won't even have to fetch after parts.

Once at Scott's, we clipped the leads across the GP relay and twisted the key. 0.03 voltage drop? Uh... something's not right here... because the GPs and all wiring are good. We check the Ohms between the GP stud on the relay and the battery ground. 2.8 Ohms and climbing? I have a bad ground somewhere. Scott and I cleaned and tightened both battery grounds - on both ends of each cable.

Back to the meter - we check the Ohms of the GP stud to the battery, block, and frame... the Ohms read very near zero and are stable. Twisting the key one more time, the battery volts drop from 12.5 to about 11 - that's a reasonable drop for working GPs on an already warm truck. The voltage drop across the GP relay held firm at the 0.03 volts - the relay is still hangin' in there after 300K miles. The real test is Monday morning - then the temps dip into the single-digits within a couple of days.

 

I've noticed the battery terminals on my truck get crummy very quickly. They appear to need regular servicing, this is a good find. Poor grounding circuits are very a common and overlooked condition.

 

Any of you guys use the battery terminal sealer? The last time I replaced my batteries (over a yr ago) I cleaned the terminals up real good on both ends, secure them and then used some CRC Battery sealer and it looks the same as the day I did it. Puts a nice protective layer on it.

 

Frequently wiping any oozed water/acid off the top of the battery helps, too - do this every time you open the hood for any other reason. The 'ooze' creeps over to the terminals and is wicked-up into the connection, where the corrosion starts.

 

It got down into the low 30's here last night but tomorrow morning and the next will be the real test with the temps down to the lower teens. Rich have you fired up stinky yet this morning?


Have you noticed anything difference from the house back into town with number 5 tightened up?


Well, I'm off to the stealership for the turbo to spider clamp.

 

Long story short? You think it was a ground issue? If so, at what point do you think the fault was at?




Denny

 

I love that stuff, just need to be careful spraying it on or it's all over the place. My truck might be dirty for 9 months of the year, but the terminals are always clean and tight. Old school method for terminal cleaning/protection is a syrupy mixture of purple Koolaid, brushed on.


How cold did it get Rich?

 

Fluid Film works very well.

 

I still had a little romp action, but not as serious as before. Scott and I dove in with the meter again, and we still had that pesky 1.8 Ohms between the battery cable (below - not on the battery terminal) and the block. We got mean and nasty this time, grabbing wire wheels and a sanding drum for the cordless drill. That got the contact to the engine block squared away - all it took was to remove all old surfaces from the battery cable and the contact area on the block.

This morning will be the tough one... I need to go shopping for a tripod today.

 

Rich - are you running Rotella T6 or a full synthetic? That totally cured my romps, even with 2 bad glow plugs.

 

Starting in neutral seems to cure the romps in my truck. Think it has something to do with the trans range sensor not sending the correct signal to the pcm . I've read that some folks cure the problem by changing to 5w40 oil.

 

There is more to it than oil and glow plugs. Were slowly getting it though.

We had tested the entire system for anything out of the norm. Between my truck "Grinch" and stinky we tested the amps between battery and the hot side of the relay and both trucks read 22 amps. We also tested the UVCH to each glow plug and got 2 ohms so everything is working on the hot side. As for the ground goes which may be playing the role on the romps as the ground from driver side battery to engine block was reading 1.5 ohms and climbing. They need to be at 0.0 ohms like the passenger side.

 

A few clarifications here: The GPs were reading 2 ohms each on the driver side... which is not good. After cleaning every external contact and aggressively going after the battery cable connections to the block, we finally got the Ohms so low that they were below the range for my meter - looking like a dead short.

Another thing - I can't say for sure the total amps are 22 - that sounds a bit low to me. I can say that my induction amp meter (designed for AC) registered an identical 22-amp spike on both trucks. Given the tools I have on the road, I'd be inclined to say "close enough".

I'm not in a hurry to jump in the truck today - simultaneous blizzard and dust storm warnings dissuade me from leaving my warm beverage and panoramic view of the storm.

1500 miles on Mobile1 5W-40. 50K miles on new injectors (not reman). 400-425 PSI compression (tested 2 or 3 months ago).

 

As far as battery terminal corrosion, I've been using Vaseline for almost 50 years and it works for me.