i live in upstate n.y. where we have cold winters and my dad is looking into a diesel

but is worried about with him working 8 hr days in this cold weather him not being able to plug in the diesel heater to keep the diesel from gelling up at work and then it not starting for him


and also something that he brought up that i am not sure of was he mentioned something about the military trucks of which some are diesel in alaska and other cold places how is it that they will not have any starting trouble without access to a pwr source for the diesel heater??

 

The newer the diesel the easier they are to start in cold weather. We start our PSD's at around 0 degrees farenheit without plugging them in.

The old ones you had to worry about the fuel gelling. It's not a problem now.

 

[updated:LAST EDITED ON 13-Dec-02 AT 11:13 PM (EST)]Your talking about 2 different things here. Fuel gelling is a problem with poor quality fuel and/or lack of anti-gel additives, "plugging a truck in" will not cure this. Hard starting can be a result of many things, the most common of are (again) poor quality fuel and/or lack of additives, bad glowplugs, bad batteries, worn pump/injectors. While it is true the new electronic-direct injection engines are easier to start in extreme temps. than the old mech. ones, they still are limited by the above mentioned items.
Some things you can do to help are BUY QUALITY FUEL. I try to buy from large, high volume truckstops. The volume of fuel they run through their tanks helps to keep the water level low (ALL storage tanks have SOME water in the bottom, fortunately the suction tubes clear the bottom by several inches, allowing for this) also, they seem to use additives more regularly. If you are going to frequently start the truck below 10deg. without a block heater, the use of SYNTHETIC oil is stipulated (by default) in the owners' manual by the required viscosity for those temperatures. In other words, you won't find a non-synthetic oil at the recommended viscosity for use at extreme temperatures in a turbo-diesel engine. I use Valvoline Extreme Blue 5W-40. It runs about $18-20 a gal. but well worth it.
You will also need to use a fuel additive if you plan to leave the truck shut down for extended periods at these temperatures. I use Howes and have never had a gelling problem. For extended temperatures below 0deg. you need to keep the truck running, if it is to be parked outside, unless you have an electric fuel tank heater. Finally, make sure you change your fuel filter regularly, even if it looks ok, the more viscous low temperature fuel will have a hard time getting through even a lightly soiled filter and the strong vacuum will only excellerate the gelling proccess.

 

just for some more info as if you hadnt noticed i know nothing of diesel other than that when my family did the small moving company and would rent u-hauls we had to plug em in in cold weather or they wouldnt start but hen agai that may have been because uhaul doesnt take too good of care of their trucks anyway...

but as to what the truck he is looking at is it is some kind of an 89-90 chebbie with i would assume the 6.3 liter diesel which is what i think they used for quite a while if im not mistaken

 

> but as to what the truck he is looking at is it is some
>kind of an 89-90 chebbie with i would assume the 6.3 liter
>diesel which is what i think they used for quite a while if
>im not mistaken

OH, you did'nt say it was a chevy. new recommendations are as follows:

Park it in September, use it again in April.