Friday, September 27, 2019

Day 42 - Sand Hollow, ID

Today was a 300 mile day across Oregon on Hwy 20. A pretty relaxing day tough we lost an hour when we crossed the Idaho border transitioning to Mountain Time. There was only one truck stop in Burns, OR, and their diesel price wasn’t too bad at $3.159/gal. We are at an RV park in Idaho with 50amps and sewer so we could do laundry. Plus, it’s a pull through site so we didn’t have to disconnect the car. The gentleman in the next site has a 2005 Beaver with a Caterpillar C9 engine. I asked about smoke when cold and he told me about how it runs when the water temperature is under 100°F. It over fuels so you get a lot of unburned fuel out the exhaust system.

I used the block heater for about 3 hours and it started much easier this morning. Much better than on Wednesday morning. On Wednesday, I actually had to use the feature which connects the house batteries with the chassis batteries to get it started. 

4 comments:

  1. So that starting feature is normal? Hope you find a cure. Does it have an ECU? Nice looking rig.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That’s what was suggested. Basically running richer when cold to help starting. It does have a grid heater in the intake manifold. It does have an ECU but very proprietary software to manage it. And it also controls the Allison transmission.

      Delete
  2. I wonder if that's why all the diesel trucks are running 24/7 in truck stops and the north slope

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. They could be hard to start after getting cold soaked. Many over-the-road trucks now have an APU, which is a fancy name for a generator, to provide power to the truck, provide heat or cooling to the cab and keep the engine warm. Cheaper to operate than the engine.

      Delete