Diesel Exhaust Fluid

retmil46 · **Posted:** Fri Jan 23, 2009 4:57 pm

Diesel Exhaust Fluid (DEF) is Cummin's trade name for the urea solution they'll be selling for 2010 compliant trucks.

Here's a pdf answering some questions on it -

http://www.fleetguard.com/pdfs/product_ ... B10033.pdf

32.5% urea, remainder deionized water.

Get this - freezing temp is 11 F. Hey guys, forget worrying about frozen or gelled fuel - now you have to worry about your federally mandated emissions hardware freezing up and having a big ice block of frozen horse p### under the hood! :lol:

They claim the vehicles will be set up to still start with the system frozen, that the heat from the engine will thaw out the tank, and in addition there will be a heater system installed in the tank - ie, tank will be that much more expensive now.

What about the rest of the system, the pump and lines running from the tank to the exhaust? Are you gonna need to have them heated as well, lest they freeze and burst, rendering the system totally inoperative?

And you're not allowed to add any type of antifreeze - that would change the solution concentration and render it ineffective for emissions.

On top of that, it's going to have to use a plastic tank - this stuff is corrosive to aluminum (ie, body and engine parts).

Hmmm. electric heater with a plastic container - seems I've heard of a similar setup having problems before. :wink:

Gawd, and I used to think DPF's and Regen mode were a cruel joke.

onthehunt · **Posted:** Fri Jan 23, 2009 5:17 pm

Seen this coming a long time. We are all witnessing the death of diesel powered consumer vehicles. Businesses have also seen the light. Guess what kind of engines UPS has been buying for their panel trucks? They are in the process of switching back to gas. Negatives far outweigh the positives on new diesel. EPA wanted them gone and they regulated them out. Kinda sad.

truckbouy2 · **Posted:** Fri Jan 23, 2009 6:35 pm

AS OF YET.... :shock:

We don't have any vehicle inspections here in the banana belt state, where NOTHING is allowed. So I can foresee the landfills being furnished in abundance with Cummins' outstanding idea.
At least until the state ponies up the billions to REBUILD inspection centers that they sold and tore down after stopping the last state inspections. At this point we have a 6 billion dollar deficit, so if I replace the Silver Cloud (03 Cummins Ram) with a brand spankin' new '010 I'll have a nifty high tech DEF system to sell on ebay.....

retmil46 · **Posted:** Fri Jan 23, 2009 7:06 pm

Diesel Exhaust Fluid.... guy that came up with that name must be the same joker that gave the Navy Mail Buoys and Relative Bearing Grease.

warp2diesel · **Posted:** Fri Jan 23, 2009 7:16 pm

Put a sprayer head on and draw designs in the law of a conspiracy nut. Letters like DEA, FBI, CIA, BATF will help the local liquor store and taverns make a few bucks. This process would be called Selective Artistic Lawn Fertilization where the fertilized grass would grow twice as fast. A friend of mine once had a cross growing in his grass one summer :lol:

retmil46 · **Posted:** Fri Jan 23, 2009 7:24 pm

warp2diesel wrote:

Put a sprayer head on and draw designs in the law of a conspiracy nut. Letters like DEA, FBI, CIA, BATF will help the local liquor store and taverns make a few bucks. This process would be called Selective Artistic Lawn Fertilization where the fertilized grass would grow twice as fast. A friend of mine once had a cross growing in his grass one summer :lol:

Better yet, in the same design as some of the more publicized crop circles. :shock:

The mother ship is waiting...... :wink:

grywlfbg · **Posted:** Fri Jan 23, 2009 8:54 pm

retmil46 wrote:

Diesel Exhaust Fluid.... guy that came up with that name must be the same joker that gave the Navy Mail Buoys and Relative Bearing Grease.

Heh yeah when I the thread topic I thought it was a joke.

Reminds me of the USAF version: Roll of Flight Line and a bucket of Jet Wash :mrgreen:

warp2diesel · **Posted:** Fri Jan 23, 2009 9:00 pm

http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=htt ... image&cd=1

or

http://www.airdelights.com/waterfree_urinal.html

Too bad the salt will rust out the 304 stainless steel exhaust.

Cowpie1 · **Posted:** Mon Jan 26, 2009 12:59 pm

onthehunt wrote:

Seen this coming a long time. We are all witnessing the death of diesel powered consumer vehicles. Businesses have also seen the light. Guess what kind of engines UPS has been buying for their panel trucks? They are in the process of switching back to gas. Negatives far outweigh the positives on new diesel. EPA wanted them gone and they regulated them out. Kinda sad.

Maybe the UPS panel trucks, but for those of us who pull a little heavier, diesel is still the only viable choice. Just can't seem to get 500 hp along with 1800 lb of torque effeciently from anything but diesel. International is bypassing the SCR method and just using a little high tech and a little more egr to meet the 2010 emissions standard in their MaxForce engines. They were darn close to meeting the 2010 standards with their 2007 compliant engine. One thing that is a positive on using the SCR method is that the engine can finally be tuned to be more efficient and let the SCR and DPF clean up the mess. There seems to be a lot of evidence that the 2010 compliant engines are getting about 5% better fuel economy. Detroit's DD15 is showing good results. But it might get far outweighed by the maintenance costs involved with this system. International is promoting a "less maintenance required" approach to its MaxForce engines for 2010 since they are avoiding SCR with the added bonus of substantial weight savings. I have been taking a harder look at them recently.

Death of the diesel at the consumer level may be true. It's all about cost on the sale. SCR and DPF are going is going to jack up the price to a sale killer level no matter how you look at it. It adds about $15K $20K to the price of a big truck at a minimum. Then add the continuing cost of addtitional DEF and maintenance. Heavy truck owners are better about dealing with maintenance issues and can get a handle on any additional requirements of a new system. The consumer is only in "plug and play" mode most of the time. Having a bunch of extra complex systems on a diesel engine will cause a death of it anyway. Consumer Reports and a host of other media outlets will raise a stink on the reliability and cost of having a diesel car. A majority of consumers will get stranded because the engine will go into shutdown due to lack of DEF the owner forgot to add. Heck, they can't seem to change/add oil or coolant like they should. Now, lets see if the local soccer mom remembers to check and add DEF to the vehicle as well.

Oh well....... I will hold onto my '06 CRD and my '06 International with Cummins ISX for quite some time and let the mess sort itself out. Regarding my truck, I am good till about 2012 before I will really need to consider another purchase. By then, a lot of the bugs should be worked out. Since both my CRD and Cummins are similar wet sleeved engines, I may just rebuild them both and continue on and forget the new stuff.

warp2diesel · **Posted:** Mon Jan 26, 2009 5:21 pm

My brother, the Ford fuel systems engineer is treating DEF as inevitable and it's going to happen.
Who knows, our lawn mowers may need DEF next, we never know what the crowd in DC or the CARB will dream up next.
All we know is that it will cost us money :!:

gmctd · **Posted:** Thu Jan 29, 2009 7:02 pm

Yep - you could also mix malonic acid with it, for a portable source of much-needed caffeine..........................

onthehunt · **Posted:** Fri Jan 30, 2009 5:17 am

Quote:

International is bypassing the SCR method and just using a little high tech and a little more egr to meet the 2010 emissions standard in their MaxForce engines.

Have you actually looked at one of these engines installed? I was told there was an engine somewhere in that mess of turbos,pipes,hoses,and wiring. It almost looked as bad as a post-2007 Cat C-13. Not what I would call maintenance friendly. Cummins has the market pretty much sewed up.

Cowpie1 · **Posted:** Sat Jan 31, 2009 3:46 am

onthehunt wrote:

Quote:

International is bypassing the SCR method and just using a little high tech and a little more egr to meet the 2010 emissions standard in their MaxForce engines.

Have you actually looked at one of these engines installed? I was told there was an engine somewhere in that mess of turbos,pipes,hoses,and wiring. It almost looked as bad as a post-2007 Cat C-13. Not what I would call maintenance friendly. Cummins has the market pretty much sewed up.

Nope.... I have my hands full in dealing with all the diesels (all pre '07) that I own now. I am not even going to consider anything else for about 4 years minimum. I just threw the MaxForce engine into the discussion. I am going to wait for all the big fleets to suffer thru this transition and get the bugs worked out before I sink my $$$ into new stuff. Heck, I am considering buying a pre egr 12.7 Detroit or Cummins N-14, rebuilding it, and then sticking it in a glidder kit truck. Then I will have a brand new truck with a fully legal pre egr engine and forget spending an extra $15-$20 thousand for a pile of EPA mandates. The nice thing about big trucks is you can have a brand new body/chassis/interior and an engine from any other previous year..... all 100% legal to title and put to work on the road. Man... what a country! Of course California has its own ideas on things but even if I hauled out to there, I don't have a thing to worry about till 2014. I haven't hauled to California in over 11 years and have no desire to do so.

I would have to disagree that Cummins has the market sewed up. Detroit Diesel's DD15 and DD13 will be real good competition for the Cummins lineup. Now the other OEM engines like Volvo make a lot of claims, but so far have not proven to be able to cut into the market that well. You see them in a lot of local/regional stuff, but don't ask any of the fleet owners or individuals who have a Volvo or Mercedes engine in a Class 8 OTR tractor how they like it unless you are dying to learn all the latest swear words. Volvo seems intent on really improving their quality, but the PR damage is already done so they have a lot to overcome.

onthehunt · **Posted:** Sun Feb 01, 2009 8:44 pm

Volvo..... Driver's swear by them. Mechanics swear at them.

Diesel Exhaust Fluid

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