The manufacturers that are making truck engines are having problems, or rather the owners of the trucks are. Difficult to maintain and expensive to repair.
Diesel engines require heat generated by compression of air to ignite the fuel as it is injected into the cylinder. So when cold, some combustion cycles occur late or not at all until temperatures are attained. That combined with cold oil that hasn’t started to flow in crank bearings makes them noisy on startup. Diesel combustion is generally a very violent and irregular combustion process even at temp and requires special coolant to prevent cavitation near cylinders in the cooling system, and sometimes overrunning clutches on driven equipment to compensate.
@@jonhunt5408 : You are right about cold starting, but the rest of what you wrote is nonsense. Diesels are inherently very smooth and clean burning when warmed up. If the combustion process was irregular you would get lots of smoke and that simply doesn't happen. The duration of combustion typically lasts from a few degrees before top dead centre to a few degrees after, about the same as in a gasoline engine. Since, the power output is no greater and usually a lot less, it cannot be a violent process. Diesel engines typically use a water/antifreeze + corrosion inhibitor mix, the same as gasoline engines. It used to be famously said that Rolls Royce car engines are so smooth that you could rest a coin on the engine. Engines made by Cat, MTU, Cummins etc are just as smooth.
@@keithammleter3824 what I wrote is accurate. Volkswagen uses overrunning clutches on their alternators on diesel engines because without them they are destroyed by the engine vibrations. If you fail to use proper diesel coolant in your diesel engine then damage is being done to your engine block and cylinder sleeves from cavitation. That cavitation is caused by vibration that is inherent to diesel engines. Smoothness can be achieved with multiple cylinder designs and with the addition of balance shafts.
@@jonhunt5408 What utter rot! Diesel engines use the same coolant as gasoline engines - look up a few owner's manuals or parts manuals and see. For example, Caterpillar specifies water + ethylene glycol 50:50 mix. See Cat publication LEBW4978-03 Cooling Systems, or any Cat operating and maintenance manual. This is the same as specified in General Motors GM 6277M for their gasoline car engines. In both cases a dye (to identify leaks) and supplementary corrosion inhibitor is added to what they sell. I used to work for a diesel engine dealer and none of their engines, made by a major US manufacturer, had overrun clutches on their alternators. No balance shafts either. Neither did the engines of our competitors.
