CAT D6T S#GMK00636 (2012 Model) I got called out on this jewel yesterday. After talking with the operator, I climbed on the machine and started the engine. It immediately started banging from the front lower end (sound like missing gear teeth or a loose oil pump mounting) 0 KPA oil pressure. I'm pretty sure it is some type of oil pump problem but at 2600 hrs? Highly unusual to me. Any of you CAT fellas seen this or can possibly check for service bulletins on this? This is going to be an expensive repair. By the way, the operator said that they could hear something going on 2 days BEFORE...........yeah, I know.....
I had a 5000 hr DJY serial number D6NLGP get its oil pump replaced by cat store do to it sporadically losing oil pressure , it has over 8k hrs on it now but i swear it has a very slight lower end knock when you hit the switch to rev it up , this was before i was working on the equipment other wise i would have told cat to roll in all new bearing at the same time regardless..this aint much help ,, when i get a chance i will fire up my laptop and see if i can find anything in sis im not the best at it but i will try if someone doesnt beat me to it
Vetech63, Wish I could help but way too new for me to have ever seen one. But what do they use this for that a machine only has 2,600 hours on it in over five years? Don't you love it when an operator or owner says things like that? With that kind of mentality involved I would be very careful to not let any of your money get exposed! If you don't have access to SIS and need something looked up let me know.
Check your email, I found four bulletins. Three of which are directly related best I can tell. Oil pump failures etc.
Thanks fellas! Ill keep you guys up to date. Not sure I'm getting this job yet......depends on whether there is any assistance from Cat.
I'd be interested if Cat does anything to help, like send a crate engine !! Sucks for the owner
Cat just looked at this machine today and came up with the exact same diagnosis I did. Now it's time to see if there will be any assistance from Cat on this repair. Stay tuned.......
Yeah, just as I figured.....CAT isn't going to help with $#*T. Let me just save everyone some time and future heartache.........Once you buy your new machine, expect NO customer support once it is out of its original warranty. Ill get this oil pan dropped next week and see how bad this is and Ill take/post some pictures.
Not having a good feeling about what you are going to find inside that one! Not thinking this is going to be an in-frame repair. Hope you have prepared the owner for what he might be getting into!
Ive already spoke with the owner about the possibility of future failures ( turbo, bearings, fuel system, etc......) because of oil contamination. This could turn out to be a HUGE ordeal. Told Cat the same thing, it fell on deaf ears. Cat just don't give a dam around here, buyer beware!
I finally had the time to start on this machine Thursday and got the pump out. I will post pictures shortly.
Believe it or not , this was still in hanging on by a thread until I started to unbolt it from the block. then it fell off in 3 major pieces. I believe this is the cheapest oil pump I have ever seen on a $30k+ Tier 4 engine of this size.......and to have this kind of failure at 2600 hours . One of the pick up tube bracket bolts had already came unscrewed and was lying in the oil pan. CAT KNOWS they have a problem with these as there are several instances recorded in the SIS for bolts coming loose, but I haven't found a service bulletin. I'm not even sure they even have an update for this POS. Just be warned!
Pump may be a piece of junk design but why in the world would an operator keep running a machine for two days after noticing something that did not sound right? And if the operator had aid something to his boss and boss said keep running it then that boss needs to be fired! I personally would not touch that job unless I was given permission to strip it down to bare casting and pull every core plug and oil galley plug to run a gun cleaning brush through them and that includes any plugs in the oil galleys of the crank. Oil cooler should be scrapped or exchanged for Reman as well as turbo. Short of that I would want full payment for parts and labor before engine was even started along with a paper signed by the owned agreeing that there was absolutely no warranty of any kind!
looks like an aluminum pump housing? if it is, there's your smoking gun. the different expansion rates of cast iron and aluminum make it harder to keep things tight. also, the aluminum can imbed metal particles that can cause the pump relief valve to hang up and stick-usually open, causing low or no oil pressure on start-up. had it happen on a newer automotive engine. in my opinion, cast-iron oil pumps gave minimal trouble, but nowadays manufacturers save weight at the expense of reliability
I think cat has used an aluminum pump like that on the 3126 and C7 for years without many problems.
This is EXACTLY what happened from what I was told.
Agreed, but ill tell you how this will play out. The owner will elect to gamble on this and have me do the oil pump replacement with an oil change. I will in turn supply no warranty of any type on ANY related engine failure (which will be stated on their invoice). I will get paid on this as I always have from them.......they have never screwed me over in similar situations......Ive done work for them forever. Will they get lucky? More than likely not without a turbo or fuel system failure here soon. Its kind of good for me in a way.......since CAT will do nothing, if the engine fails Ill get the entire job, and they will only have themselves to blame. Ill keep this up to date as time goes on.
Still sad to see what could be a good engine with a long life after the rebuild be turned to junk to save some time and money up front. Any chance you can talk them into at the least a new oil cooler?
Whos your dealer and did you talk to anyone at corporate. Publicity like this is expensive
Sent another request for assistance with pics to the Warren Cat sales rep. Probably wont get anything done either but worth a try.
Sent and denied again, no big surprise there! Customer is doing what I expected, oil pump replacement, filter, and fresh oil......then lets see what happens. I should have this running by noon so hopefully he is on a lucky streak.
If it runs good and you think it'll live....go buy a lottery ticket!
Well the owner kind of deserves what ever he gets when I read things like this: By the way, the operator said that they could hear something going on 2 days BEFORE. It would be hard to feel sorry for him especially if that "operator" is still drawing a pay check!
Here is a picture of the oil pan cleaned up. I have everything back together and was getting ready to do an initial fire up and check. Hit the key.......nothing. Seems a rat has decided to make a nest or 2 since this machine has been down, has my start circuit and action alarm down.......and a tier 4 emissions error. I have to now fix the electrical damage to even run the engine. This may be the job that never ends.
CAT tech dept. says something higher in the gear train has come apart and had gotten between the gears and broke the pump. Nothing in the oil pan to suggest this occurred. Its pretty obvious the oil pump idler bolt backed out......what say you?
Sure looks like that pump idler gear did not like where it was and decided to make an exit!
I just sent this pic to the CAT product support person Ive been dealing with. I'm real curious as to what the response will be THIS time. LOL
cat used to be the standard every other manufacturer had to meet. sad.
Did you pull a rod cap while your were that close?
Checked everything I could, looks good from what I see.
A catastrophe like that is paid for out of profit unlike scheduled repairs. Hopefully it will run but if the owner said run it I can't feel to sorry for him, can't imagine saying that or doing it as an operator.
I got the electrical bugs worked out yesterday and fired the engine up for the first time. Believe it or not, it sounds pretty good! Oil pressure was great by the live values. The operator ran the machine after I was satisfied with the initial checks, said he believed it to be normal. It did have a low manifold pressure alarm come on at first (within the first minute of operation), turned the machine off, restarted, and it never came back on. I watched it work for about an hour while cleaning up and will being going back this afternoon to check it again.
The owner of the dozer told me yesterday that a CAT rep from Peoria contacted him late last week. We will see what happens there! He told me the rep admitted they have had the same type of issues with these oil pumps on many other engines. The owner told me he had found about 30 other C-series engine oil pump failures online (at YouTube I think). I haven't had time to verify that.
I hope you are planning on doing an oil and filter change the next day at the least!
And a filter cut as well IMHO....
Yes that would go without saying, but glade you did say it. And I would keep this daily process going till cutting filter apart showed nothing. At the bare minimum do the filter if the owner will not go for the oil change!
Tell me the same operator isn't still running it.
Yea, doing that this morning.
Of course! Some things never change.
Maybe the owner will get a failure analysis team to look at this. Couldn't hurt to ask for one from Cat.
Machine running well. Fresh oil change didn't produce any metal in the oil. Customer has got dam lucky on this so far. Ill find this post if there is a failure later and update. I'll also update if any assistance is rendered. Thanks All!
IMHO that machine deserves to be named after all that's happened. We used to call anything like that Boris, after "Boris the Bullet Dodger" character from the movie Snatch, because "by ***k we dodged a bullet there" .........
Good Idea! Nige, Ide like to name this machine in your honor! That's ok, right!?
No problem, nothing that says we can’t have a bit of fun while doing we’re doing the serious stuff .... BTW If anyone is unfamiliar with the movie you really should watch it, it’s a classic.....