diesel maintenance questions

[plasticmaster]

I'm considering the 2014 Ram 1500 diesel, but I've never had a diesel before. Besides pumping diesel into it instead of gasoline, what are the differences with maintenance and upkeep? What about the cost of maintenance and upkeep vs. gas? I currently drive a 2000 Silverado 5.3L V8. Thanks.

[NinerBikes]

I have a 3.0 L v 6 tdi Touareg that I use for towing my travel trailer. 16.5 to 19 MPG pulling about 4500 lbs and 21 foot of travel trailer.

Maintenance, due to expense of a MB 229.51 600 ppm low sulfur, low phospate, low ash 5w-40 diesel motor oil will be a bit more expensive.

When you need batteries, you'll need a pair at the same time, not just one. I go through about 3 to 3.5 gallons of DEF every 10000 miles. $10.00 worth or a bit more at any big rig truck stop, if bought in bulk from the dispenser pump. More than offset by the savings in MPG.

In Los Angeles, diesel is 3.93 a gallon, RUG is 4.07. I have zero problems getting better than 30% MPG over a gasser on open road with no rush hour traffic.

You'll pay a little more for it, but that's just the price you pay for a torque monster. If you abuse it, you'll pay dearly on a diesel motor. If you service it by the book, treat it right, don't overwork it or over heat it, take your foot out of the accelerator when its working hard with a heavy load going up hill in the heat, it will go 300-450,000 miles. In light duty... In heavy duty, throw all that out the window, it's borderline abuse. This is a LIGHT duty diesel motor. Understand what it's limitations are, use it for light towing, up to 50% of it's rated tow weight, and tow less that 10-15% of the miles acrued on it, and it will outlast you. Diesels do not take well to being abused, parts and drivetrain goodies get real expensive on them real fast, when you get a cowboy behind the wheel that thinks everything he lays his hand on is a tool to be abused.

Oh, and I have no problem getting 30 MPG when not towing... in a 5000# SUV that is all wheel drive, all the time. As good as 35 MPG when empty and at 60-65MPH. EPA ratings totally penalize diesels, and reward gassers. Many folks do better thant the highway EPA rated MPG in diesel, by a long shot. But you do have to relearn how to drive the torque in a diesel, not the RPMS or the horsepower, like in a gasser.

[MNRon]

I too was a little anxious when getting our first diesel a year ago. After 20k miles (5k with trailer) I have to say it's great. I haven't used any additive and just pump diesel instead of gas and don't worry about it, no gelling or othe issues even with our very cold winter in MN this past year. I do use the radiator cover in winter when not towing, no starting problems.

Oil changes cost more. DEF is about a gallon per thousand miles, $3 per gallon if you pump it at the truck stop.

Mileage is better, especially when pulling.

Bottom line, I'm well past any anxiety and loving having a diesel, although recognize I pay a little more for it.

[tim_and_amy]

yea, there is a lot of bad info out there from non diesel owners. I got the same feed back from this group.
I eventually went to the ford dealer and talked to the service advisor and punched it all into a spreadsheet. Diesel will save you money over the long run if you maintain it properly. The nice thing about a gas engine, you don't really have to maintain it, and most people don't, they just drive them into the ground and rarely even change the oil.

Diesel allows 7500-10K between oil changes, depending on usage and types of diesel you are using.

MPG are way better. My V10 excursion would squeak out 11mpg and with a tail wind and 55mph 17. My diesel excursion would get 17 no problem and wasn't uncommon to see 22mpg.
My F350 averages, averages, 15.1mpg with 4.10 gearing driving at 65mph. My F350 is 100% Stock.

Now, that ram 1500 ED will get consistently 26mpg on the freeway during the break in period. Four wheeler magazines has already done several write up on it since last year. They stated, that if you used hyper miler techniques it was easy to get 30mpg.
So let me put this into perspective for you. Lets, take my f350 at 15.1 mpg and compare it to that ram at 23 mpg avg. If your fuel cost 3.95 p/gal and you drove 17K miles per year, your truck would use $2919.57 in fuel where as I would use $4447.02, you would best me by just over $1500 in that first year.
You are talking about a truck that is getting mileage better than a minivan and up there with mid-sized passenger cars.

[naturist]

Perrysburg Dodgeboy wrote:

From what some say on here the very southern states do not have a winter blend. So if you were to fuel up in one of those states you could have an issue, if infact this is true.

Don

Not sure which are the very southern states, but I do know that diesel fuel needs and usually gets winterized based on expected area low temps. So you ought not be surprised fuel bought anywhere might be prone to gelling if moved a few hundred miles north. Around here, 10 is considered really cold, zero is brutal, and they start talking about records at 10 below. So when we drove our Jetta TDI to northern Ohio for Christmas with the family a few years ago, I made sure to start the trip with about 500 miles worth of fuel in the tank, and fill up adding a shot of anti-gel additive about 40 miles before we got there so it would have a chance to mix. Next morning at 33 below she fired right up and ran like a train in spite of being 400 plus miles north of home.

[Perrysburg_Dodg]

srt20 wrote:

chevor wrote:
Good for you. I have gelled up, its not fun to have a truck that won't start on the side of the road at temps below -30.

What resale value?

When, 1975?

From what some say on here the very southern states do not have a winter blend. So if you were to fuel up in one of those states you could have an issue, if infact this is true.

Don

[dave17352]

Love my 2011 chevy 3500 duramax but I have had some DEF issues covered under warranty. I do have concerns with emissions but other than that what a great way to pull.

[C_Schomer]

I keep my maintenance records and UOAs. My last CTD truck had 94k miles and was 9 years old. I sold it in 2 days sight unseen for $5k more than compatible gassers were bringing. That's resale value! I don't know of anyone beside me who tried a gasser class 8 running 80k lbs. It was a 549 IHC with 5x4 boxes and I got 1.5 mpg loaded and 3 empty. I was shifting every 20 seconds and it wouldn't outrun a cow. There's no question which is better for heavy work. Craig

[chevor]

:SMy trucks don't have spark plugs

[gkainz]

srt20 wrote:
... A lot of Internet mechanics, that in real world couldn't change a spark plug or glow plug ...

That's why I have a Cummins ... don't have to do either one! 😄

[NHIrish]

The short answer for you is that if you don't need diesel...don't get it. I have one ONLY because I need the torque. They are a pain in the a##.

[chevor]

February 2014
Not all stations "treat" diesel fuel.
Only time the truck quit on my in 570,000 miles.

[srt20]

chevor wrote:
Good for you. I have gelled up, its not fun to have a truck that won't start on the side of the road at temps below -30.

What resale value?

When, 1975?

[Old-Biscuit]

My first diesel was my current truck.

7 yrs. and I'm not really sure whether it has cost me more in routine maintenance or not....I don't really keep track (gas vs diesel) cause I don't care. Just do the routine maintenance as needed (actually I do oil/filter changes more frequently).

I bought diesel cause I tow........period!

[Tystevens]

Maintenance on my 2500HD diesel was maybe $70 more a year than on my 1/2 ton gassers. At most. Really, everything else was a wash, although I did change my own oil and stuff like that, so that helped, and my 6.6l Duramax only took 10 qts of oil and no DEF. But regardless, I wouldn't think the maintenance would be a significant cost, all things considered.

I never had a problem starting or with fuel gelling, even at temps down to -20*. Never plugged it in, only an occasional bottle of fuel additive for some reason (I could never tell a difference).

[jus2shy]

edbehnke wrote:
differences?
cost about $5-8K more - Not true for the RAM, $4,600 upgrade over pentastar motor (Gas V6), $2,800 upgrade over the HEMI motor. Depends on where you measure from.
oil changes more expensive - This will be true, Seems like oil cost per quart is bouncing between $7 and $9 bucks a quart online. The VM Motori motor uses about 10 quarts of oil and it has a special rating, ACEA C3, which most US oils don't meet. Got to go online to buy the oil
fuel costs anywhere from .50-1.00 more - Not true across the whole country. This depends on your locale. In my neck of the woods, Diesel is once again the cheapest fuel undercutting regular gas by up to a dime, or costs the same as regular unleaded
mileage will be "a little" better - I don't know about a little. Depends on what you base it off of. Are you comparing against the Pentastar? Or the HEMI? If you compare against the pentastar motor, then fuel economy improvement you're looking at is roughly 16% or 17% fuel economy benefit. If you compare against the HEMI, then you're looking at 29% fuel economy benefit. Again this depends on your baseline.

FuelEconomy.gov

As for additional maintenance. The Fuel filter is extremely cheap on the Ecodiesel. Went to Geno's out of curiosity and was extremely jealous of the $28 fuel filter. The HD diesels currently run between 80 and 100 bucks for a fuel filter kit on a Superduty or RAM HD.

VM Motori diesel requires oil changes once a year or every 10,000 miles. This seems to be the case for the HEMI as well. So with the diesel, in the case of the 1500, you have the added maintenance of changing a fuel filter about once a year and currently pricier oil changes due to the requirements of the VM Motori motor. It's too bad we can't just use some good ol' shell Rotella T6 or Delo 400LE Synthetic. However, the oil filter itself is a pricey piece of kit, hitting about 50 bucks on Geno's(most expensive oil filter I've ever seen). Hopefully prices will come down over time.

What you don't have is spark plug changes at 100k miles, but it's almost a non-issue since most owners trade their vehicles out at that point. Spark plugs are also cheap, just a pain to get access to, especially on a HEMI motor (What you pay mostly on those spark plug changes are labor rates).

The VM Motori also uses old-school solenoid activated injectors which are far cheaper and proven reliable over the long haul. So the injectors should easily last over 300k miles. The only concern I'd have over the fuel system is that it does seem to use the legendary Bosch CP4 which has been known to have issues in the Ford and Chevy vehicles. However, Bosch builds these pumps to the specs of the vendors so I don't know if this will be an issue on the VM Motori. Only time will tell.

As for DEF consumption. If you buy it bulk from the trucker's areas at 2.80 a gallon, you're essentially adding a nickel per gallon of diesel on your total liquid consumption. If you buy from say the jugs at Walmart where it averages about 5 or 6 dollars a gallon, you're adding 10 cents per gallon of diesel for running costs. I personally bought a few containers and refill them along with my truck at the trucker fuel stops when I'm passing by. That way I don't have to make many trips and I can keep my DEF topped off.