Newbie, c15 help needed

[david lichterman]

Hello all,

I am new to large trucks , coming from medium duty 550/750 / cat c7 world

I am currently researching to build an expedition vehicle with design cues taken from the Europeans ala www.actionmobil.com

I have looked at the f750.. Don't like it... I want a COE for reduced length.. Every foot counts in the expedition world. I have looked at the 6x6 MTV military, it is underpowered for my desired weight (10-12k load plus chassis, perhaps 25-30k lbs total). My plan is to super single all 6 wheels and add TDM auto AWD to the front for a true 6x6. Add larger military tires and perhaps air suspension.


Which led me to a freightliner argosy. I need pre 2007 as I am planning a South America expedition ... High sulfur fuels...

I have located a 2004 argosy with a MBN serial numbered c15 with an Eaton 10spd tranny.

1. I want c15 to be bulletproof with a healthy balance of reliability and power.. In that order.. And I need help understanding what it will take to accomplish this as I have read many problems with this era c15

2. I want to convert the Eaton manual to an auto transmission... And I need tech help with that as well...

I have not purchased the chassis yet and wont until i get my atms around tye potential. If anyone can help me understand these questions and perhaps others I have not thought of... Greatly appreciated...

Thank you in advance

D

 

[Duck]

Super singles will leave you stranded for a LONG time when one of them blows out. You won't just need a unique tire brought in by mule or something, but you'll need a new rim too because they get destroyed when the weight drops on them.

A C15 is way more than enough power for your application but it will be nice to have if there are lots of steep grades.

Automatic transmissions in "18 wheeler" size are still kind of primitive & unreliable. Probably almost non-existent on that continent. Only in the past 5 model years or so have they begun to approach reliability but I still hear complaints.

The last thing you'll need is to have transmission issues in the middle of the Amazon with all kinds of venomous creepy crawlers slithering around while you're underneath the truck trying to fix it.

If you're going to be doing a lot of low speed crawling I'd go with an 18 speed manual. You'll just have to learn how to operate it or hire a driver.

I don't know much about the C15 in particular but this guy does.

 

[TroyMotors]

An auto trans is the kiss of death in an off road big rig.
Its extremely important you control rpms and torque to the wheel when in off road conditions.
You can not do that with an auto.

I say these things cause I drove off road for several years in the oil fields of north dakota and also drove a dump truck off road when I first got my cdl.
I was driving 18spds pulling 140k lbs weights up and down steep inclines during 90 degree summers, rain storms were roads washed out and during -60 winter storms.
I think I have an understanding of what a truck can do and what it can't.

And from my experience and watching others with automatics ...I would stay far far away from a automatic trans in an off road big rig.

as for the super singles....again. You shooting yourself in the foot.
I worked with 2 guys in the bakken who had super singles on. During the winter they were cursing the tires every day. At the slightest snow fall, it was time to chain. Cause they would not only not have traction up hill but they would slid backwards down hill.


If I was you I would look for a PRE 99 truck. NO EGR.
A cat or Detroit or a cummins is fine.
Double lockers
18 spd
Extra fuel filter system
Water system filter and if it already has on, mount another filter.
Snorkel system for ait intake (look at Australian trucks for those)
Dont forget to put a snorkel system on the axel breathers....otherwise you will get water inside the pumpkins...
and a snorkel breather for the trans also.
You should be able to get to the doors in water and be fine if you have those. Don't forget to insulate the fuse box...to avoid water from getting in there.
you ll also need a manual switch to the engine fan so you can keep temps down while you crawl over stuff...
I would also make sure you have a NEW APU on that truck. Incase things go bad. YOu can have electrical power. Also carry a spare compressor for the tools you will carry.

Your truck will need to roll, air up, and have power to the fuse box in case of an emergency. Usually those are the big issued requiring a tow.

You'll also need tools tools and more tools with you and spare parts for days if you wanna really make it in an out of bfe.

If you have to have that cat mbe, make sure you do a single conversion turbo package on it.

More info then you wanted but I lived out of my truck for weeks at a time in the oil fields and no shop insight. Now mech in sight and no tools in site. Sometimes we would get stuck in snow storms and had to be able to sit for days on dirt roads away from towns.
It would get so bad we were constantly chaining. Not just regular chains but double chains with added claws on the ribs of the chains...

I had dump truck off road 16 ply tires on my truck with noobies so big the chains would fall in between the knobs. So I can vouch for what I say when it comes to off road semi driving.

Its super hard on trucks and unless you have a double frame western star log truck built for Canada log hauling, your gonna be working on that truck all the time.
Frame flex causes all kinds of snaps and bends to parts.
Shock mounts break, cross members snap, air bag mounts pop off, bolts just snap off....wires need to be extra insulated to prevent chaffing and shorting.

 

[TroyMotors]

Those are my tires below. Open should 16 ply dump truck tires. They are much harder then road tires.
Last to long abuse over rocks and debris.
The wrecked red truck was a buddy of mine who was cheap on tires and came down a hill one day and had zero traction...and that was the end result of cheap tires.
Cheap tires off road = zero traction when you brake or turn the truck.
The blue truck was a buddy who chaffed a fuel line on his Cat and was leaking fuel on something hot and cought fire.
Thats the result of all the shaking of driving off road.

 

[TroyMotors]

These were the chains we used before we put the claws across the ribs for extra grip.
And the other pic is sht I was always in.
That was a dry cold day. Imagine a warm wet day...They would shut roads down all the time due to mud were I was at....
You would just sink and bottom out the truck. It would take big bull dozers to get you out sometimes.

 

[Duck]

The blue truck was a buddy who chaffed a fuel line on his Cat and was leaking fuel on something hot and cought fire.

Every time I hear of that happening it's a Cat engine. The C15 I think.

I saw one burning up on a ramp onto an abandoned weigh station in MN once & there were no emergency vehicles there yet & I didn't see the driver so I stopped as quickly as I could & but right as I popped the brake knobs I saw him in my right mirror.

Solo driver, out safe.

Pete 379. Truck was immaculate. The fire was on the driver's side but on the passenger side I could see that engine looked brand new. Nice trailer too.

He said he'd just made his last payment a few months earlier.

I took off when I realized there was nothing I could do to help & my truck was only about 50 feet ahead of it and I didn't want to get blocked in by fire trucks.

 

[TroyMotors]

My truck almost caught fire while I was there.
On my 07 Detroit motor.... there is a aluminum fuel line coming from the back of the head going back to the fuel pump. It is strapped along the block with these little See pic below.
The black rubber coating wears off on those little clamps. Then its a sharp edge against aluminum hose rubbing each other.
Mine chafed and leaked down the back of my head and on top of my trans.

I was doing a pretrip and under the truck one morning and saw the fuel leak. I tracked it down and found the problem after a few hours of work.

Needless to say after that I could those same clips holding a water line in also.

I took them off an inspected them and found the same problem developing.

I wrapped them with a layer of gorrilla tape and reinstalled them.
The factory black coat lasted 750 k miles. The gorilla tape strip is thicker and should out last my truck engine. So as far as I am concerned the problem is fixed.

Those clips hold a water line in the front of the block going from the water pump to the compressor. That line is also an aluminum line so the same problem could arise.

Since that fuel line leaked on my truck I went ahead and removed all the old zip ties and the black plastic insulation on my electrical lines in the engine bay.
I re-insulated them with the same wire wrapping (forgot what its called) and all new zip ties and tucked everything better then factory and also insulated and isolated the lines from heat and any moving parts.

That's bean counting time consuming work but it prevents all kinds of future head ache.


My point is that if y our going to do any kind of trucking off road you better understand and prepare for these break downs.

Several guys with the c-15 engine were chafing fuel lines against the frame, the return fuel line. The one that goes back to the fuel tank was the one chafing.

You do not lose engine power. No check engine light. Not symptoms at all. You just get a massive fuel leak and a puddle....

Both my fuel lines coming from the tank going to the fuel pump have been wrapped with hard rubber jackets that insulated them from chaffing and also debris like rock flyin up from the front wheel and hitting them.
When your on dirt roads, rocks get caught in the wheels and fly every were all the time. You'll find little pebbels every where in the engine bay. You might as well be driving with out a hood on some roads...Its that bad.


This is all probably more info then the original poster wanted but I always thought of building a truck into an rv to travel the country in style and hit up Alaska.

I personally would start with an old dump truck or log truck and build from there.
I'd strip it down to cab, power train and frame and start from there. Stretch it an throw a box in the back. Then that box would be the living quarters.

 

[TroyMotors]

Here is another cat that caught fire. Driver was idling while inside a truck stop on the Indian rez in ND. Next this you know it was on fire.
But this started from inside the sleeper from what I remember.
Probably some fridge or inveter line chaffed or came loose and caused a short and a spark then your blanket catches it and its all over.

 

[Duck]

Here is another cat that caught fire. Driver was idling while inside a truck stop on the Indian rez in ND. Next this you know it was on fire.
But this started from inside the sleeper from what I remember.
Probably some fridge or inveter line chaffed or came loose and caused a short and a spark then your blanket catches it and its all over.

Yeah. Inverters not installed right scare the hell out of me.

I've found them run through the sheet metal without grommets, without a fuse block at the battery end, and with improperly attached crimp terminals.

You can't half-ass that stuff.

 

[TroyMotors]

Yeah. Inverters not installed right scare the hell out of me.

I've found them run through the sheet metal without grommets, without a fuse block at the battery end, and with improperly attached crimp terminals.

You can't half-ass that stuff.

I installed my own.
And zip tied it and insulated it also.
I didn't get a fuse yet. LOL
But that was cause I was lazy and will do that in a few days. Truck is parked now anyway.
I just put a large invereter in last trip out.
I need to put the fuse on.
Drivers don't know that you have to put a breaker at the battery end because if something goes wrong you don't want a live wire from the battery floating around rubbing everything cause your truck is grounded in several spots.
It would be a sparking nightmare.

 

[Duck]

I installed my own.
And zip tied it and insulated it also.
I didn't get a fuse yet. LOL
But that was cause I was lazy and will do that in a few days. Truck is parked now anyway.
I just put a large invereter in last trip out.
I need to put the fuse on.
Drivers don't know that you have to put a breaker at the battery end because if something goes wrong you don't want a live wire from the battery floating around rubbing everything cause your truck is grounded in several spots.
It would be a sparking nightmare.

Twice now I've picked up abandoned trucks and saw where the driver had removed his inverter & left the cables just lying on the floor next to each other.

I carry electrical tape and a Crescent wrench with me when I recover trucks now. Crescent wrench to disconnect the + at the batteries, and electrical tape if it happens to be a trillion degrees below zero & it's one of those trucks with the batteries locked in a damn vault that you can't easily get to.

 

[TroyMotors]

Twice now I've picked up abandoned trucks and saw where the driver had removed his inverter & left the cables just lying on the floor next to each other.

I carry electrical tape and a Crescent wrench with me when I recover trucks now. Crescent wrench to disconnect the + at the batteries, and electrical tape if it happens to be a trillion degrees below zero & it's one of those trucks with the batteries locked in a damn vault that you can't easily get to.

they dont own them and just dont care in the end. I used to do repos and its amazing what people do to things they use and do not own anymore.....