Chuck FB

Good on you for having the welder and the tig experience, I am severely lacking when it comes to welding and only have a stick welder at my disposal and so seldom weld ( its embarrassing to admit ) and once in a blue moon I do some brazing with ox/ac. As to that link to the pan, I don't expect that pan will fit on your gas truck and I've not looked just lately at the various companies that make higher volume aftermarket pans but it certainly had been not long ago that they were all for the Duramax because it doesn't have the cross over pipe and so it would have to be an oddball pan made for the gas truck to have a deeper sump if that was sought after. I believe the Dorman pan is a direct factory volume swap that either the diesel or gas can use and my guess is that they made it because they added the drain plug, like the factory should have done in the first place !.

Yes that is true as per the aluminum bung and designed for the plug style you want and if you did decide to do that lets say rather than the Dorman pan, one would have to find a shop that has skilled tig aluminum welders on staff. Definitely easier to buy a pan ahead of time and the filter and oil etc so there are no hang ups. Oil, again your able to purchase that quite reasonably cost wise through Rock Auto as one source and I know from buying oil to have on hand from the dealer here in Canada, they were kind and dropped the price from the normal dealership price when buying it by the full 12 quart case, its not an oil most other parts supply retailers carry up here I found.

That would be the way to do it by having a bung welded on or as was suggested on here as per buying a Dorman pan and I will admit I cringe every time I hear that brand come up but its not a very expensive pan through Rock Auto as long as one is in the states, it would cost many times that if bought in Canada ( for no logical reason ). Being that your in Florida your exhaust may not have the sort of rust that happens very quickly on a salt covered winter road and the two nuts that join the break point at the rear of the trans might undo easily. Between that and undoing the hanger on the trans you might be able to flex the Y pipe without too much stress to the header flange mount. I don't know if there is a seal or gasket of some sort at the manifolds to Y pipe, as long as it would not ruin a sealing surface perhaps the hardware could be backed off just a bit at the manifolds if need be, again as long as the hardware isn't all seized up. Your trial will prove good information as to what method will allow the pan to slip out.

If you decide to install a drain plug into your factory pan, take some photos of it and whatever information if any that you used to decide on the location to install the plug. I expect there would be certain spots or a best location to install it due to not interfering with the trans filter for example or the locations of the magnetic pads. I also presume any of these aftermarket plug install solutions will unfortunately have to stand up a distance inside the pan and takes away from allowing as much fluid to be drained out vs if one had a specialty bung welded into the pan that did not have an internal rise above the bottom interior, or bought an aftermarket pan that fit the limited clearance of the exhaust cross over on the gas trucks.

The Edge or Banks units, are they compatible with the gas engine as they appear more refined in how they are made as well as rigged up with methods to mount them vs the scan gauge.

I definitely like the various fuel mileage perimeters it gives including the miles to empty although I assume it bases it on what its been doing prior and if hooked up to a trailer it would then need to cycle through some fuel to gain the appreciation of being very thirsty. Deleted pickups is common place here if its possible to delete because the government isn't bothering anyone with deletes, not yet anyway. However when I was doing the diesel/gas debate there was no solution on the market then for the global B GM trucks and not sure if that has now been resolved or not but also do a delete and along with it goes the warranty and that whole game. I decided the costs of the whole picture was out of hand for what they charge for deleting the up to 2023 duramax and would become a real issue to repair any problems on the road as a dealership would not be able to touch it. I have diesel farm equipment all around me but older with little to none of the emissions crap on them so resigned to going a simpler and less powerful route. Interesting how the computer on your past diesel figured the mileage one way when empty but fell into line when loaded. I would think there are times you miss it because of the power and fuel economy, but like you said before the gas setup with the aux tank allows you to have a common fuel for your generator as a slide in camper doesn't give room like a large trailer with basement storage compartments to overload the trailer !.

Does your truck qualify for warranty yet, although I realize even if it does that means waiting and waiting for yet another valve body that more than likely still has the same built in failure issues ... all extremely frustrating. The reason this transmission shop I talked to in person had a question mark when it came to the Nextgen kit or method as it were, is orings on a moving part such as these spools. Wear on the orings etc was his worry because for the most part he claimed that orings in a transmission are on stationary items that seal the oil from escape rather than cycled/moving parts. That's one persons opinion and its not like he has even had a kit in his hands nor installed one. The proof will be in its use, will it cure the issue and cure it for a long time. If I was in your position I'd be very tempted to do as you plan also, there is no real good answer when it comes to dealing with issues like this as it makes one feel like your beating on a dead horse to keep it moving. Keep us posted as to how it goes, what your mechanic thinks of the kit and how it seems once your able to try it. I imagine he will cut open the filter to make sure things have not gone sideways in the trans and take a read on what is on the magnetic pads.

You got me with this bar rate number, I imagine it relates to something such as how much the bar ramps up in pounds per some measurement distance, certainly a number I've not noticed before. Those two wheel drive trucks, yes if they are within the years that have the same bar fitment as these 2020 plus chassis have ( or are there a few years prior that these current bars also fit into dimension wise ) , then having the ability to look at the bars to measure accurately as well as take a part number off of and if your able to see the door post sticker to confirm what front axle rating they have. Piece all the info together and compare the diameter to the mystery Cognito bars. What are the odds that they have been laughing all the way to the bank and pretending stupidity at the company, we may figure this out yet. I have not seen a two wheel drive truck for a number of years now, on dealers lots or used for sale. What was so common up here for so many years has now become the unicorn in the newer model years that is. Still some older trucks on the road that are two wheel drive but less all the time as they rust up if used in our winters.

Its more about the theme of the odd quirk in how the fuel tank seems to fill with a slower flow of fuel and due to that I can't trust hand calculating which is something I had not encountered before. I'll see how it seems once I do go on a longer drive and am fuelling up at stations and hopefully then see how close the computer is to hand calculated. Just never know how much to trust a computer system. The technology/information is there in front of me as far as fuel calucations, its if its trust worth or not in my mind, yet anyway !. Does the scangauge give information like actual engine oil temperature and pressure, true voltage output and gear position. Of course this is a global B truck so hard to say what its compatible with compared to the global A system. With this new dash it tells what the fuel mileage is between key starts but deletes itself after the engine is shut down ( again based on what a computer is telling me ) which is interesting simply because the truck is able to do an over all trip calculation as well as this point to point key cycle calculation all at the same time. I've noted that on my particular drives of about 50 miles one way to or from town, that final start and heading home I can get as good as 17.5 as long as I drive easy and keep the speed at no more than 62 ( 100 km an hour that is ). While 17.5 may not sound fantastic and again that would be pure highway driving with no headwind but a bit of hills and everyone else blowing past me like I'm going backwards, trucks from many years back that were lower and lighter would never think of getting that sort of fuel mileage being driven easy, fast ratio gearing in top gear and engine refinements have certainly made a difference.

I wonder if there is more to it than software, if its a combination of both the computer control factor and a valve body issue. Back to the dealer of course and can see if there is a different course of action now given its almost a year later from the first dealer visit. When I had talked to a local transmission shop on the topic of these transmissions, because most of the issues end up back at the dealership he has not had the opportunity to work on one or even touch a valve body because a new valve body would be impossible to get ones hands on other than a dealership. I had mentioned NextGen Drivetrain to see what his response was and he didn't know much about them but certainly questioned the whole concept of orings on spool valves, but did mention that in his world of rebuilding transmissions that two companies stand out that have developed a lot of transmission fixes over the years, TransGo and Sonnax and would have faith in what they develop. I see both of those companies have a few little items they have come out with and its a few parts for the valve body and one of those items looks to be involved with preventing the transmission from trying to go into more than one gear ( the rear end momentary lock up issue ). I am purely speculating but I just wonder if your transmission is trying to pull that stunt and why the slam shift feel. I don't recall when they said that software update came along that is supposed to be warning the driver that something is starting to go wrong with the transmission, yes I know its completely retarded but wondered if your trans electronics had that warning software update. Different truck and trans but a friend just had his 2023 1/2 ton with its 10 speed decide to go stupid and was dropping out of forward or reverse out of the blue on his way to work the other day and had it towed off to the dealer and they diagnosed it as the valve body, now its wait for who knows how long before they get the part to throw on it as there was already someone ahead of him that has been waiting almost 2 months for the very same thing on his 1/2 ton. But I bet if one goes to the Ford or Ram dealer your going to find pissed off customers, oh and add Toyota to that list.

Thanks, I've never messed around with the dash on that series to know what information the instrument cluster or the center info screen has. What I have found with this truck and might apply to GM trucks for some years now, because I have a gravity flow fuel storage tank on the farm which has a slow flow compared to a typical station fuel pump, I find the tank filling to be wildly inaccurate from one top off to the next if the trucks fuel is over 2/3 full. The trucks computer was saying one thing fairly consistent to how I drove and my mechanical fuel meter was telling me something wildly different, one trip to town it would hand calculate to fantastic mileage and the next tank horrific mileage. Just something I've never encountered with a vehicle before but for some reason this has a quirk to being filled slower than what is typical at a fuel station pump does. Of course I don't dare try to "fill" the tank as I understand the evap system would not like that and may even ruin something in the process. So me being the person that has only hand calculated all my life as no vehicle I personally owned had diddly on it to tell me what mileage it was getting, now I am dependent on the computer if filling at my farm. I guess that's called progress ... maybe ! LOL.

The dash information of the WT models, does it include the best/average of the 25/50/450 mile distances ?. While I realize its not giving realistic fuel mileage it lists on the "best" side category, certainly in the 25 mile distance, I'd be curious to hear what numbers others with the gas trucks have shown. Mine happens to show 19.3 as a best 25 mile while on the other end the best 450 is 15.2. I have not been on any longer drives with it so don't have a handle on what to really expect as its been my typical drives 50 miles one way to a small city and back along with running around the city some and just driving it easy and no load. The fuel mileage just drops when driving around town, no surprise there with a heavy truck and some engine restarts.

Same would apply to installing a lower temp engine coolant thermostat as long as it didn't cause issues on the other end with running too cold and causing too low an engine oil temp increased sludge buildup and fuel dilution. Starting at the base of a climb with coolant and engine oil and trans temps well in check give that edge over the same fluids at elevated temps as your beat before you start climbing the hill and yes, turning off the air conditioning before a hill in those more extreme hill and temp conditions.

Good point there that I had not thought of, when I was reading his comment on the empty trucks trans temp running around 185-190 I was comparing it to my truck not being pushed and in the 70's outside and assumed it was due to driving fast on a hot Texas day that it ran that hot, not about this high temp bypass for the cooler. Whoever thought that was a good idea for an HD truck to crank up the trans heat that much, good thing someone at GM pulled their head out of their behind and corrected that. Road testing I've seen with the Ford HD trucks with the 7.3 pulling the same load on the same stretch of highway as a 2024 GM gas so both 10 speeds, the Fords temps were even more insane yet, I can't see that making a Ford trans happy either.

The thread I would agree with but not the actual rod diameter from what I at least measured the other day. I'd have to remeasure using a micrometer to say with 100% certainty. Its quite noticeable when looking at where the threads end and the solid rod continues, how the threads are larger in diameter than the rod itself.

I am so limited in the metric bolts and nuts I keep on hand but a while back when I was looking at the ubolts and measured the unthreaded rod and came up with an approximate 5/8 or 16mm diameter and also noted that the outer diameter of the theads is larger due to how they formed the threads, I took a 3/4 course nut and it spun on easily although it was loose side to side. That told me the approximate thread pitch as I never did pull out my metric thread pitch gauge to get an exact figure. Unless I am off and I believe I mentioned this in another comment that its highly likely the thread is a 18mm with a 2.5mm pitch. However its not an 18mm diameter rod so bolt charts won't take that into account, nor would it be easy to find out what actual material GM is using for the ubolts. The only thing I can say with certainty is that a deep 1 1/16 socket fits perfect and that should equate to a 27 mm socket .. so if one does not own much for metric tools the standard socket works perfect !.

That got me wondering, just what is the OE thermostat rating of the 6.6 gas and I find slightly conflicting numbers but 187 to 190 seems to be the temp rating. Looking on Rock Auto I see an aftermarket company MotoRad makes a few temps, 187 OE, 180, 174, 160. I haven't a clue nor is it probably easy to find any spec on the mechanical thermostatic fan hub as to what temp they lock up at but I know years back that the theme tended to be that they never kicked in nearly soon enough so the engine was already well above a comfortable operating temperature by the time it kicked in. I played around with the bimetal spring on a hub to lower the kick in temp and covered over the grill for my tests to see where it would lock up engine coolant temp wise, didn't want it kicking in too low either as a locked up fan takes a lot of power and locked up all the time would put a lot of stress on the fan drive. In that particular truck which was a half ton I could drop in a rad with more cores that the 3/4 etc trucks used as the dimensions were the same. What I could not do is put a 3/4 ton fan on it as the drive is more stout to drive that deeper fan that moves more air on the heavy duty trucks of the time vs the marginally built 1/2 ton cooling system.

Very interesting and why I had asked, that is vastly different in consumption but also two very different engine load and over all rpm operating scenarios. I also have to wonder as Grumpy Bear mentions engine oil temps, if the oils raised temperature during high load operation is a factor in its high use. That also makes me wonder if different oil formulations and their varying viscosity at temperature ( higher viscosity ) could assist in preventing as much oil from getting past the rings when the engine is highly loaded. Overpasses, that makes sense and again my driving along not pulling anything and its night time and unaware of the surroundings, one misses those details. That reminds me of a bridge/overpass by Corpus Christi and I thought it was near Mustang Island but it looked like a wall as in steep as one approached it, that was quite the overpass where ever its located.

When the truck in the past was driven without the trailer and from the starting point of a fresh oil change, what distance was it able to obtain before being down one quart ?. I've been on that stretch of highway once and heading northbound but its so many years ago and most of the drive was at night but isn't that a fairly flat stretch of highway ?. South bound you would drop 700 feet between those two cities and at those low elevations is where I have found vehicles to get the best fuel mileage, if all else is equal with fairly flat ground and no headwind vs high elevation. But speed with a high wind resistance unit, that kills fuel economy and the amount of power required is vastly higher than if one was idling along at 55 to 60 mph with the same unit.

I was thinking about the M18 nipple you bought, was that a straight nipple with a barbed end ( and not a 90 degree fitting ) and do you know what hose size your fitting was made for as the larger a barb size one could get assuming it would work in that confined space, the faster the flow into the trans and easier on the upper/engine end to adapt a funnel to pour the oil into the hose. On the left side of the case there is supposed to be a filler plug that faces up and is higher up on the case as the drawing shows, I haven't looked much to find that one and probably need a mirror to locate it and the challenge there would be to clean the area up good before removing that M18 plug if used but the hose would not have to have a sharp bend, that could be the possible issue with the right side plug that is on the side of the case. Wouldn't really know until a fitting and hose was set up on the right side to see how it worked out. Yes I could buy a fancy air pressured unit that I could see the volume of oil going in or instead buy a dedicated five gallon pail pump and dump in quarts into the pail and pump it in by hand, have pumped quite a lot of gear oil out of five gallon pails over the years and certainly that would do the trick too. Of course this is all nit picking stuff relative to that exhaust to pan clearance issue which turns a bit of a job into something many times more complicated for no good purpose.

Yes that is a good point as not everyone has had prior hands on with ubolts for leaf springs and won't realize every move that is made affects the outcome of the job. Its trying to get the front and rear of the leaf spring within the clamping area sucked down evenly as well as side to side. I do many steps throughout the clamping of one leaf spring wheel end, making sure its all touching the axle mount plate ( the welded on perch ) and part turns of each nut in that sequence and raise up the torque evenly is what it amounts to. Even though it doesn't sound like much as per the half turn after the 96 pounds is established on all four nuts, it is in torque terms because of the course thread. That's why I would recommend doing a mark on each nut and continue the pattern as they lay out to evenly get to the 180 degree final point on each nut as it may take another 4 if not more short pulls on the flex handle or torque wrench ( which ever is used at that point ) to reach what amounts to 3 more flats of each nut as per 180 degrees of rotation. Spoiler alert, plan to expect the final torque to be reaching in the ballpark of double of what the initial torque set is, the torque ramps up that much with this course thread, it would all depend if lube had been put on the ubolts or they are very dry etc as to what it happened to be when done.

Excellent, I knew you would know but then to mire through all of our chit chat to set us straight, thanks for the confirmation !

I like the idea of the product you pictured, I have tried using a shake type paint marker and maybe it was the brand or age of it but I wasn't thrilled with what it would do but have seen mechanics use the shaker marker with success though. I just went through my ubolts and while I did not loosen them all I did experiment with a couple of them by backing them off and going to 96 and then the additional half turn and at least with the condition my ubolts are in ( a few months old from time of truck manufacture ) , with that course thread they use the torque ramped up even more than I thought it might to get the extra half turn. They are tight now and again rather shocking as to how much lower the tension was on them with relatively little use of the truck and never with a load or pulling a trailer to help work/stress the suspension. Its no wonder I have seen comments of truck owners talking about their springs creaking when having a load on it such as a slide in camper that is rocking from side to side as the ubolts became way too loose and the springs are shifting around under use, that is not good or safe. As far as this method GM uses to reach the ubolt stretch value they are after, they would have their reasoning of course but as to how the plate is loose/floating and so forth, I doubt that is it as like I said spring shops just go straight to a torque value their hardware they handle has a spec for and no messing around but keep in mind they do it in stages to torque them up evenly due to the nature of ubolts and how they work. Then either bringing the unit back at some point or rechecking yourself after some use with the spec they give. I've had a variety of ubolts custom made at a spring shop over the years and everything from pickups to semi's and I get the spec from them and then assemble and do the initial torque and after some use go back over them to retorque, of course with the larger trucks its 500/600 ft lb on the front axle and around 1000 on the rear which for me means hammer the nuts on good with a 3/4 impact on the rear ones.

I am almost tempted to loosen one of my ubolt nuts and then perform the 96 lb plus a half turn. As I mentioned before after looking at torque charts I experimented with mine by increasing the torque as they were sitting around 100 before I touched them and all I will say is I increased that number considerably but unfortunately did not mark the nuts to see where I landed in rotational degrees. Being that your hardware is new and not rusty I'd encourage you to go through the process and by the time you get around to it the nuts may not be torqued much beyond the 96 pounds and might be able to start from where they sit now or slightly back them off and then torque to the 96 to feel confident about then marking each nut so you don't loose track and turn them all another 180 degrees. Then at that point play with the torque wrench to see what torque they generally are sitting at. I will take a wild guess now that it may end up being in that 140 to 150 range. Update, as I suspected I low balled my numbers to be on the safe side LOL, never the less will be interested to hear what you come up with when you have a chance to mess around with your truck.

Oh sorry, I saw the ZR2 listed at the bottom of that post and now that you point it out, that is listing your own truck !. Ok so that clarifies the issue and being that a 2500 can have the upper overload if ordered a certain way which ends up basically being like the 3500, they used that generic drawing including the overload. This still unfortunately does not take away from the fact that its a goofy spec to work with to recheck the torque of a fastener, however its the spec one has to work with through GM.