Got an active event and discussion with my trusted Caterpillar tech lends me to believe that the DPF needs to be exchanged. I'm curious as to whether anyone here has simply done the "ash service regeneration" and not changed the DPF. Is it worth the gamble? Soot loading and regeneration dont appear to be abnormal. C9.3 in a BZY machine. Also has the updated (and now cleaned) pressure differential venturi.
It can be done but I've never done it. I'm sure you know that ET is needed to perform the Ash Regen, but did you know that the license number of the ET that performs it is recorded in the engine ECM? I doubt you would be able to find a dealer who would be willing to take the chance so you would need someone with a unauthorised ET licence. Although it's not particularly cheap to buy, it's an easy job to replace the DPF (on your machine.) I recommend getting the reman with new bands, 20R8028.
It just going to start regening more and more and cause issues if you do that. Been there done that. Also replace the ARD head at the same time cause that will take you down in another 1000-2000 hrs or so if it hasn’t been done. We do DPF and ARD head at the same time and usually no issues for the next 5000 hrs. If DPF costs are an issue take it to a truck shop and have it cleaned and throw it back in instead of the Cat exchange.
Not disagreeing, but curious. My ISX505 & ISX600 motors have over 10k hrs, and one just had the DPF baked because regeneration became more frequent. The other is still working as designed. So, I can only surmise that the 5k hour mark is, well, arbitrary. This one works as designed, too. I'm not saying that the DPF doesn't have a service life. It's just that I expected to see a deficiency dictating servicing as opposed to some arbitrary number. As for the ARD head, why replace? Does the ARD cleaner not work? Not worth it? Nozzle looks just like the one in my waste oil furnace. What p/n is it? Using SIS, and searching "ARD", I'm not seeing it.
AFAIK the ARD head doesn't have to be replaced, just the spark plug.
Just my 2cents from the 30 plus around me. Please do whatever works best for you. ARD cleaner may work just most machines after going down once or twice, losing production and having to call the dealer find it cheaper to replace the head and have it perfectly clean, new fuel screens, spark plug etc. If you have the time, skills and luxury of time to remove, clean and reuse to save please do try. Again the ARD head replacement is a proactive repair
When I worked for the dealer we were told the time to change the DPF was more a factor of fuel used and the 5,000 number was just an average time frame to get to the fuel used number.
As far as know cat wont sell you the fuel nozzle a couple years ago i tore one apart to look at it and called my favorite parts guy he told me cat wont sell that part just the whole assy. I ran the landfills d8t to 5600hrs with the warning on till the undercarriage needed done, then had cat do the emissions service while it was there for tracks, the ard head had quite a bit of erosion going on with it so that was replaced with a reman aswell
Had it cleaned shortly thereafter. Just saw another thread on DPF, and remembered that I had this document.
That is an interesting document.
Reading this thread and though it is old, there is something that wasn’t addressed and needs some clarity. The ASH service regen in ET is only used to remove all the soot prior to removing the DPF for an ash service. It isn’t feasible to simply perform this service procedure, reset the ash level in ET and do nothing with the DPF. As for my general practices with these, I typically do not remove at 5000 hrs for an ash service as it is only a level 1 event, I usually wait for the level 2 event to come active before removal as you can get hundreds if not thousands of hours between a level 1 and level 2. This is due to the level 1 being purely hour based (5000 hrs) and the level 2 is based on how the machine was ran throughout the 5000 hrs. This is my experience with these, maybe it’ll help someone who wonders through here in the future.