Power Wagon Registry

Well, I got my airbag recall letter today, so since I was off I went to the dealership to set an appointment. I got the appointment set, the service writer is walking around the truck and smells anti-freeze(mind you, I've been complaining about smelling it to them for a while). He opens the hood, it's really strong in there, and there is none in the bottle. Uh oh...looks like that will be looked at next week too. Where do these things usually leak from, and why?

What year? My 2004 5.7 Hemi (non-PW obviously) sprung a pretty good leak around the thermostat one time. Easy enough fix.

2015...

My 2011 has a bad gasket around the water pump housing. When I turn the engine on I can see a small trickle of water around the pump and down. Once it gets warm it seals up, and my coolant has never gone down though. When the antifreeze fries it leaves kind of a white chalky residue, try looking for that around your engine. Do you notice any milkiness in your oil?

I ran it all day yesterday - grocery shopping, running errands for the wife, drop off/pick up kids from events. She ran hot 218 most all day, never could find a drip/drop or anything. I searched high and low for a leak and/or chalkiness. None found. : ( It'll be alright, it has a warranty, right? : )

Isn't the odor of antifreeze in 4-4.5Gs something that was discussed a while back? Did anyone come up with a cause?

I seem to remember it being a common complaint.

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The bad thing is, there is nothing left in the reservoir for the truck, bone dry...not sure where its going, but it isn't hitting the ground!

JFordBronco wrote:I ran it all day yesterday - grocery shopping, running errands for the wife, drop off/pick up kids from events. She ran hot 218 most all day, never could find a drip/drop or anything. I searched high and low for a leak and/or chalkiness. None found. : ( It'll be alright, it has a warranty, right? : )

My 2011 ran hot all the time, it was a bad thermostat. Runs much happier now.

Running hot and burning coolant. Did you check if your oil was milky? Head gasket leak? Is your engine running normally or does it sound off at all like the timing is bad?

sounds normal to me, but I came from a '12 Power Stroke, runs fine to me. Oil was normal, it gets checked religiously after the last oil issue I had with it.

I'm curious about this. Mine smells of coolant on occasion and appears to lose the smallest bit from time to time. I have yet to report to the dealer as our local dealer is a crook (Sherwood of Salisbury, MD) and i've not gone to any other dealerships.

My truck has the goofy airbag/tumble recall but i'm nervous to go as I don't trust many service centers. I took my wife's Edge in for the tank replacement service. About 3-4 weeks later the driveshaft cradle bolts all miraculously worked themselves loose

Just got a call from the dealer, they "THINK" its the water pump. Everything is pressurized right now, they are just waiting to see.... : (

My experience has been the thermostat gasket. It is a bad design. Designed to fail. Had this issue on my 04' 2500 4x4 Hemi & now i believe I am having it again with the 2008 PW. To repair, I just went to NAPA & for a $1.68 or so, bought a 6" square of gasket material. Remover the T-stat & housing, put the housing on the gasket material, traced it out, cut it out, installed it & no more leak. The thin rubber gasket that goes around the edge of the actual t-stat, is the only thing keeping it from leaking. There is no gasket between the housing metal & the mounting spot metal. So, I made one.

TwinStick wrote:My experience has been the thermostat gasket. It is a bad design. Designed to fail. Had this issue on my 04' 2500 4x4 Hemi & now i believe I am having it again with the 2008 PW. To repair, I just went to NAPA & for a $1.68 or so, bought a 6" square of gasket material. Remover the T-stat & housing, put the housing on the gasket material, traced it out, cut it out, installed it & no more leak. The thin rubber gasket that goes around the edge of the actual t-stat, is the only thing keeping it from leaking. There is no gasket between the housing metal & the mounting spot metal. So, I made one.

Have you looked to see if the 6.4 shares the exact same thermostat design and gasket?

No, I have not. But because it is a bad design & makes them easy money, I can't see them changing it. But, maybe they have, IDK. By doing what they did on my truck, when the t-stat & gasket are put in, & you put the housing on, the "thin to begin with" rubber gasket gets squished even thinner. And because it is all that keeps the fluid in, if that thin rubber gasket shrinks from heat or age, it leaks. Much better to have the tradition style gasket. It protects from leaks even if the one that goes around the t-stat fails.

I am curious to know if it is the same, or not.

That is one of the many small things that aggravate the living shit out of me. Lets get real here, since motors & radiators & thermostats have been being used in vehicles, what has really changed ? A pump from the engine pumps fluid through the system to the radiator & back to the engine. The t-stat controls the heat, makes it warm up quicker by opening & closing at a predetermined temp. Not Rocket Science. So, they did not change it to make it better (it already worked fine), someone changed it to say "look, see what I did here, slightly changed the design, so we can now charge $32 for a t-stat & gasket, instead of $7, & it will fail sooner & generate more revenue !"

They took something that was simple, & cheap to do yourself & made it harder and more expensive.

So something which was very reliable and simple while being easy/cheap to maintain was made more complex to generate more service revenue. The OEMs wouldn't do that to us would they...........

soooo, got the "diagnosis" from the shop about an hour ago. The EGR Cooler sprung a leak. They are also replacing three ball joints and something on the radius arm. I haven't even had a good chance to beat on it yet and its already wore out ball joints??? Crazy...

Glad you got it diagnosed. Covered under warranty I hope ?

Like I said: VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV

NickTF wrote:So something which was very reliable and simple while being easy/cheap to maintain was made more complex to generate more service revenue. The OEMs wouldn't do that to us would they...........

yes sir, under warranty, the question is how long will it take to get fixed ?

Hope you got it fixed ? Honestly, I have never even heard of an EGR Cooler. I'm gonna have to look that up.

Everything that comes up seems to be for diesel engines.

I got it back, NOT HAPPY at all! According to the paperwork, the airbag recall was done. The EGR cooler had an internal leak(PN 4627647-AF) and they "topped the coolant back off. Well, um, the reservoir low, low enough it doesn't even make it to the MIN line. I had ball joint issues, they are sealed ball joints!! They noted on there I did not lubricate them, nor did they align the truck after they replaced the ball joint in question! I have a 600 mile road trip this weekend and I'll be driving straight, but in order to go straight I have the steering wheel turned to 10 o'clock! Soooooo freaking pissed it aint funny!!!

Well, that just sucks. Bad dealer & bad service dept's have lost many a loyal customer. If I was you, I would bring some proper coolant with you, just in case. I would also top it off before you go on said trip. It is hard to deal with morons. My shop is of the "we don't want to hear what YOU THINK it is, cause we are the dealer & we know everything" kinda mentality. It is VERY frustrating, I know, been there done that.....WAY too many times with WAY too many vehicles. Campers, trucks, cars, boats, mountain bikes, appliances, stereos, radios, speakers, etc... over my 54 years. Sorry for your troubles. Keep us posted please.

Well, not a drop of coolant was lost, I marked it with a sharpie before we left. Besides it pulling hard right, it drove normal. Im gonna take it back to the shop this evening after I get done at the range and park it. Tomorrow morning, I'm gonna go up there, get the required coolant from the guy who worked on it, top it off to somewhere between min/max lines, then I am going to wait for the alignment to get done and WE will test drive it to make sure it goes straight!

Setting everything aside.......What blows my mind the most is shops that don't do a test drive. I don't care if you added some window tint, you need to test drive it. Oh, wait a minute this thing pulls hard, lets do that alignment we forgot before calling the customer.......

My daughters Subaru was low on coolant (or so I thought), so she took it to the dealer. They said it was normal. They said vehicles today run hotter than the ones of 15 yrs ago & actually need that space (that makes it look low when cold) because the coolant expands & fills it, under normal operating conditions while driving it. So, if you fill it cold, it will actually push the coolant out, which is why we smelled coolant when driving, after we filled it cold. They said the "blue mark" is there so they know it was filled to the proper level at the production facility & that is the ONLY time, that the fluid should be at the "blue mark". Once the vehicle is started up for the first time, it goes below & stays below that blue mark.

Yeah, they should test drive them, I agree. But not many dealers are pro-active. They are usually re-active.

that makes sense. On the wife's Jeep, I filled it between the min/max line and its been fine - no purging or anything. I'll probably do the same with mine. I'll post up what I find today! Y'all have a great and happy Monday! : )