1998.5 Dodge Ram CTD - Sally
- Thread starter frojoe
- Start date
frojoe
Adventurer
Honestly the fogs appear impressively bright when you look at the front of the truck, but they have zero focus and only add slightly to the overall light output of the headlights that I have. But I did do the pair of Morimoto 4300K 35W HID bulbs in the inboard bulb locations on my dual-bulb sport headlights, and those headlights as-is are quite bright.
If the white light fog LED's were barely noticeable with the HID headlights, they likely would have been a bit better if I had regular H4 bulbs in my sport headlights, and for sure would have been beneficial in single-bulb 2nd gen headlight housings. About half the time I used the fogs was for working light in front of the truck, since the spread of the light from the fog housings was very wide and hits the ground almost immediately in front of the front bumper.
When I tried the yellow LED bulbs, they seemed about the same brightness, but gave even less visual help when in the driver's seat. But I would consider keeping these and using as work working light in front of the truck, or as front-facing amber lighting for oncoming vehicles in dusty summer conditions.
If the white light fog LED's were barely noticeable with the HID headlights, they likely would have been a bit better if I had regular H4 bulbs in my sport headlights, and for sure would have been beneficial in single-bulb 2nd gen headlight housings. About half the time I used the fogs was for working light in front of the truck, since the spread of the light from the fog housings was very wide and hits the ground almost immediately in front of the front bumper.
When I tried the yellow LED bulbs, they seemed about the same brightness, but gave even less visual help when in the driver's seat. But I would consider keeping these and using as work working light in front of the truck, or as front-facing amber lighting for oncoming vehicles in dusty summer conditions.
I just finished reading all 18 pages.
WOW, amazing write up and build! It's the first 2nd gen that have the same build style I have thought of on mine, love the OEM plus everything, keep as much factory as possible.
Like others have mentioned, that's some awesome cad and fabricating skills, also the electrical work is top notch as well!
Love the P-Pump swap and how you mounted the ARB twins.
Looking forward to see it on AEV salta wheels on a 2nd gen!
Couple questions:
ARB twin bracket are mounted to the bottom of battery tray with 2 bolts? Are they steady enough over long period of bumpy road while offroading?
How did you mount the switch pro panel OEM like inside of the cab?
WOW, amazing write up and build! It's the first 2nd gen that have the same build style I have thought of on mine, love the OEM plus everything, keep as much factory as possible.
Like others have mentioned, that's some awesome cad and fabricating skills, also the electrical work is top notch as well!
Love the P-Pump swap and how you mounted the ARB twins.
Looking forward to see it on AEV salta wheels on a 2nd gen!
Couple questions:
ARB twin bracket are mounted to the bottom of battery tray with 2 bolts? Are they steady enough over long period of bumpy road while offroading?
How did you mount the switch pro panel OEM like inside of the cab?
frojoe
Adventurer
Thanks! I'm just trying to make the truck as capable yet unassuming as possible.. partly as an enginerdy task of problem solving and improving with a tight set of constraints, and also as a bit of a knee-jerk reaction to how many Jeeps and Toyota's we see around here driving with +1200lbs and +$15K in kit bolted on, and not a single scratch or drop of mud on them. I want my big stupid heavy diesel tractor to be more capable than all of those 'standard' rigs.. and yet look exactly not the part.
The ARB bracket is a 1/4" vertical plate that the ARB is bolted to with 4x M6 screws in the ARB standard holes, and then this vertical plate is welded to two horizontal 1/4" plates.. one long narrow one that's visible above the battery tray, and one much wider one that's applying uniform pressure on the underside of the front of the battery tray, and held on by 2x M6 bolts+nuts. So essentially I maximized the amount of available flat space above/under the plastic battery tray to spread the load, considering all the strengthening ribs on the underside of the tray (red lines in the below pic).
So far it's been fine.. if you grab the ARB you can get it to mildly jiggle laterally, but if you try and move it up and down it doesn't give at all. I've also had the batteries out twice since the creation of the ARB bracket, and haven't found any stress cracks in the plastic tray.
For the SwitchPros.. that's another project that isn't fully completed yet... I chose to put the button panel in the location that previous had the 2x Volvo semi truck rocker switches, but to make it look integrated, I had to hack up the plastic gauge bezel... which of course I still haven't fully completed. But here are a few teaser pics to give you an idea...
frojoe
Adventurer
The only other update recently is a set of new tires. There was still maybe 20% life in my old 37"x12.5"x17" Toyo M/T's.. but I wanted to have fresh rubber for these snowy/icy winter months, and quite frankly the Toyo's started to get pretty scary on wet pavement with the tread pretty low. And added benefit is that I now have two good-tread tires (the old fronts) to mount as known-good spares, and the old rears which are super chunked up can be used as spares for someone else. My current two spares are on mismatched wheels, are mismatched tires, and the tires are damn near bald, so really they just roll.
Direct pickup from the local Toyo headquarters...
37" x 12.5" x 17" Nitto Trail Grappler M/T's...
Direct pickup from the local Toyo headquarters...
37" x 12.5" x 17" Nitto Trail Grappler M/T's...
Got it. I missed the two bolts that bolt on under the tray. That's why I asked, thought there are only two bolts holding to it.Thanks! I'm just trying to make the truck as capable yet unassuming as possible.. partly as an enginerdy task of problem solving and improving with a tight set of constraints, and also as a bit of a knee-jerk reaction to how many Jeeps and Toyota's we see around here driving with +1200lbs and +$15K in kit bolted on, and not a single scratch or drop of mud on them. I want my big stupid heavy diesel tractor to be more capable than all of those 'standard' rigs.. and yet look exactly not the part.
The ARB bracket is a 1/4" vertical plate that the ARB is bolted to with 4x M6 screws in the ARB standard holes, and then this vertical plate is welded to two horizontal 1/4" plates.. one long narrow one that's visible above the battery tray, and one much wider one that's applying uniform pressure on the underside of the front of the battery tray, and held on by 2x M6 bolts+nuts. So essentially I maximized the amount of available flat space above/under the plastic battery tray to spread the load, considering all the strengthening ribs on the underside of the tray (red lines in the below pic).
So far it's been fine.. if you grab the ARB you can get it to mildly jiggle laterally, but if you try and move it up and down it doesn't give at all. I've also had the batteries out twice since the creation of the ARB bracket, and haven't found any stress cracks in the plastic tray.
For the SwitchPros.. that's another project that isn't fully completed yet... I chose to put the button panel in the location that previous had the 2x Volvo semi truck rocker switches, but to make it look integrated, I had to hack up the plastic gauge bezel... which of course I still haven't fully completed. But here are a few teaser pics to give you an idea...
Looking forward to see finished product for switch pro mounting!
57Cessna172
Member
Question for you. I saw awhile back you worked on getting the Cummins toned down in the noise department. I've been working on the interior of mine to do the same. Mostly just changing old leaky window seals and door seals. Wondering how the damping material you put on the hood has worked out for you. And did putting the material on the valve rod cover help?
thank ya.
thank ya.
frojoe
Adventurer
When I originally installed the 1" foam underhood insulation from DEI, it did noticeably quiet the truck down when standing <10ft from the hood, either in front or on either side, at head height. When you crouch down near either front wheel well, it's still loud as hell at idle... there's lots of noise 'leaking' out of the gaps between the inner fenders and the frame, and from under the frame around the oil pan.
The underhood insulation also had an affect (to a lesser degree) in the cab.. but only for noise when the windows were down.. with windows up it sounded about the same noise level. I think for how quick it was to install, and that it's held up for ~5 years.. it was easily worth whatever small change it had.
For the side valve/tappet cover... I think that had a lesser effect... since the engine sounds entirely different with the P-pump, I can't tell if the reduced underhood noise is from the tamer fixed timing (~13.5 degrees), the new injectors (which also open at a lower pressure, so less violent potentially), or the tappet cover insulation. Honestly the truck isn't too much quieter when you're standing next to it at idle, but when the hood is open, the 'sharpness' of the 24V/VP44 knock sound has been softened, and I can poke my head all around the engine when its idling without feeling like I'm going to go deaf!
I wouldn't specifically go out of my way to remove components just to have access to the tappet cover, in order to add insulation to it... but I think that since it was apart anyways, adding insulation to it did likely have some small affect on noise reduction.
frojoe
Adventurer
I hadn't really had time to do any offroading in November/December... I was working 50-70hr work weeks to finish a monumental amount of design work before the Christmas holidays, so my weekends were either full of paid work, or partially work and partially off-time tasks that had been piling up.
But I managed to get out a few times over the Christmas 2021 break. During some of my off-time, I helped a friend with his newly acquired 1996 Dodge Ram 2500 extra-cab, 5spd 5.9L Magnum and Dana 60's front+rear. He's doing something neat, and making a rock crawler out of a gasser 2500. As far as we could tell, our frames match, and he has the same size cab and wheelbase as me, so it’ll be neat to see how extreme he gets, and steal some of those ideas.
I helped him rebuild his axles front and rear, with Yukon 5.13:1 gears, Yukon 35-spline 4130 chromoly axles front+rear (including CAD delete on the front axle), and Yukon Ziplockers front+rear. I think I’m going to copy him and run a CAD-delete Yukon 35-spline axles in the front, and a front Ziplocker, but maintain my current factory limited slip in the rear.. it’s super tight, and works really well. I’ll likely also get 35-spline chromoly axles to throw in the rear, then we can use my factory Dana 80 35-spiline axles as spares between the two of us.
But I digress, my friend wanted to get out to try his lockers, so we went to a local mountain that happened to have about 2” of snow on top of 2-4” of ice.. it was a slippery climb, and we didn’t get up very far with the less-capable rigs that were part of the group.
A few days later, we went to a different spot that had been dumping snow, so we had a good fun day of driving down either old two-tracks with some fresh powder on them, or plowing through 2-3ft of fresh snow...
But I managed to get out a few times over the Christmas 2021 break. During some of my off-time, I helped a friend with his newly acquired 1996 Dodge Ram 2500 extra-cab, 5spd 5.9L Magnum and Dana 60's front+rear. He's doing something neat, and making a rock crawler out of a gasser 2500. As far as we could tell, our frames match, and he has the same size cab and wheelbase as me, so it’ll be neat to see how extreme he gets, and steal some of those ideas.
I helped him rebuild his axles front and rear, with Yukon 5.13:1 gears, Yukon 35-spline 4130 chromoly axles front+rear (including CAD delete on the front axle), and Yukon Ziplockers front+rear. I think I’m going to copy him and run a CAD-delete Yukon 35-spline axles in the front, and a front Ziplocker, but maintain my current factory limited slip in the rear.. it’s super tight, and works really well. I’ll likely also get 35-spline chromoly axles to throw in the rear, then we can use my factory Dana 80 35-spiline axles as spares between the two of us.
But I digress, my friend wanted to get out to try his lockers, so we went to a local mountain that happened to have about 2” of snow on top of 2-4” of ice.. it was a slippery climb, and we didn’t get up very far with the less-capable rigs that were part of the group.
A few days later, we went to a different spot that had been dumping snow, so we had a good fun day of driving down either old two-tracks with some fresh powder on them, or plowing through 2-3ft of fresh snow...
frojoe
Adventurer
Another thing I wanted to improve on is my underside & rear lighting. I previously had 2x Baja Designs S1 floods in the rear (rear-facing) and some Super Bright LED's lens-less 120deg floods aimed down. But these got hit a number of times, and I got tired of re-angling them and exposing them to damage, so I wanted to redo the lighting and move them higher up, more out of the way.
Here is the previous setup (passenger side) when first installed... so no damage at that point...
And here is the new setup... 2x Baja Designs S2 work/scene, mounted quite a bit higher, and I think should be out of harm's way...
Here is the spread of just the one side (I haven't yet received the other S2 light to install on the passenger side of the receiver)...
And since I now had 2x S1 work-scene lights free, I ordered two more, and decided to mount two under each side of the cab, cross-firing to get better ground coverage outside of the door area...
And I mounted the previous-setup backup Super Light LED's 120* flood lights under the rad support mounts, aimed down, to better cover in front of the front tires...
Here is the coverage different between new and old. New is the driver side, with 2x S1 work/scene lights, and passenger side is 3x Amazon "3 LED rock lights" aimed down...
Here is the previous setup (passenger side) when first installed... so no damage at that point...
And here is the new setup... 2x Baja Designs S2 work/scene, mounted quite a bit higher, and I think should be out of harm's way...
Here is the spread of just the one side (I haven't yet received the other S2 light to install on the passenger side of the receiver)...
And since I now had 2x S1 work-scene lights free, I ordered two more, and decided to mount two under each side of the cab, cross-firing to get better ground coverage outside of the door area...
And I mounted the previous-setup backup Super Light LED's 120* flood lights under the rad support mounts, aimed down, to better cover in front of the front tires...
Here is the coverage different between new and old. New is the driver side, with 2x S1 work/scene lights, and passenger side is 3x Amazon "3 LED rock lights" aimed down...
frojoe
Adventurer
Next up, I needed to do some engine breather figuring out. When I swapped to the P-pump, and I used the CNC'd front timing cover from Keating Machine, I lost the ability to mount the screw-on factory breather filter, that has stainless mesh in it to filter the oil droplet out of the air. Moreover, I wanted to do a secondary filter, and have that trap any additional oil, and return it to the engine.
This is the secondary filter, an air-oil separator, originally designed I believe by Mann-Hummel, but copied by China and available all over the place. It has a 3/4" inlet and outlet (same hose size as the factory breather outlet), and a 1/2" barb on the bottom to return oil back to the engine...
I was originally thinking it could be most out of the way, if mounted in this recess on the passenger side of the plastic fan shroud, but I wasn't super happy with the inlet hose routing coming from the breather (top driver side of the timing cover), and the oil return hose routing to the spot I wanted to use on the front cover... would have been a nightmare...
Then I realized I could nestle the air-oil separator in this part of the plastic fan shroud, if I trimmed some of the plastic ribbing.. and it'd be super close to the front cover breather, and almost directly above the spot on the timing cover that I wanted to use for oil return...
This is the secondary, lower access hole cover that I want to use for oil return. I believe it's a cover allows access to the timing gear idler sprocket, which some guys used to direct-mount a mechanical lift pump to for big flow/power dyno queen applications...
Trimmed, and fitting pretty out of the way. FYI, the top cover is clockable 4 different ways, via the four mounting bolts. So I'll aim the outlet in a different direction....
This is the secondary filter, an air-oil separator, originally designed I believe by Mann-Hummel, but copied by China and available all over the place. It has a 3/4" inlet and outlet (same hose size as the factory breather outlet), and a 1/2" barb on the bottom to return oil back to the engine...
I was originally thinking it could be most out of the way, if mounted in this recess on the passenger side of the plastic fan shroud, but I wasn't super happy with the inlet hose routing coming from the breather (top driver side of the timing cover), and the oil return hose routing to the spot I wanted to use on the front cover... would have been a nightmare...
Then I realized I could nestle the air-oil separator in this part of the plastic fan shroud, if I trimmed some of the plastic ribbing.. and it'd be super close to the front cover breather, and almost directly above the spot on the timing cover that I wanted to use for oil return...
This is the secondary, lower access hole cover that I want to use for oil return. I believe it's a cover allows access to the timing gear idler sprocket, which some guys used to direct-mount a mechanical lift pump to for big flow/power dyno queen applications...
Trimmed, and fitting pretty out of the way. FYI, the top cover is clockable 4 different ways, via the four mounting bolts. So I'll aim the outlet in a different direction....
frojoe
Adventurer
I then needed to come up with an oil return fitting to the idler gear access hole cover plate. It was only 1.5mm thickness in the middle.. too thin to thread for a 1/4" NPT fitting, so I welded a boss onto it, which I then threaded...
While I was at it, I machined a groove at 6-o'clock dead bottom center, to aid in any oil flowing past the idler gear shaft stub, and back into the engine...
This pic shows the tapped timing gear cover that came with the Keating Machine front cover, and just has a 3/4" JIC fitting to hose, and hose to ground... which still would drip every so often... doesn't look good!
I also added a check valve, just in case engine pressure worked its way up the drain hose into the bottom of the air-oil separator. I had to turn the outlet of the check valve down a bit, to make a 3/8" hose fit onto it a bit better...
While I was at it, I machined a groove at 6-o'clock dead bottom center, to aid in any oil flowing past the idler gear shaft stub, and back into the engine...
This pic shows the tapped timing gear cover that came with the Keating Machine front cover, and just has a 3/4" JIC fitting to hose, and hose to ground... which still would drip every so often... doesn't look good!
I also added a check valve, just in case engine pressure worked its way up the drain hose into the bottom of the air-oil separator. I had to turn the outlet of the check valve down a bit, to make a 3/8" hose fit onto it a bit better...
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