The battle of engines

Kitty is my fav. I'm heavy haul, need a lot of motor. Detroit is a choice I would make also. 18 just works with a Cat, I like the range it offers.

 

Nobody has mentioned the old 2 cycle Detroit's,,,,,worthless junk. Do they still make those? Back in the day, they were very popular. So many jokes were made about those. I drove a Louisville Ford with a 238 Detroit, and you had to drive it like you were mad at it. I was told to slam your finger in the door, to get in the right frame of mind. Once, after a long day, parked it in the shop, it was due for a service, came in the next day for work, my truck was gone. I asked the mechanic where it was, he said, it's getting a new block put in. After they changed the oil, they started it up, and it put a rod through the side of the block. I knew of a guy many years ago, that had a V-12 Detroit, called it , "The Buzzin' Dozen". It was pushing 450 hp, a lot of horse in the '70's, but was always tearing it apart.
Mack too makes a good motor, or at least they did. I drove a R model with a 300+, although, I never thought it was anywhere near 300, as a "shiny 290" Cummins would pass me all day long, but those Mack motors were tough.
Anybody else with an old Detroit story?

 

Any of the three major brands will do a good job for you. (Cummins, Detroit, CAT). I have had better service from CAT. Parts are a little higher, but I have not had to work on the engines as much as Detroit's that I have owned. CAT also tends to have more torque. I have one CAT that has always gotten over 6 mpg for the life of the truck. Another averages around 7 mpg. Both have always been used to pull open deck freight. I usually don't go over 65 mpg and keep up the maintenance. Driving habits have more to do with mpg than most other factors. Given a choice, I would go with CAT over any other engine, except for those years when they tried to make an engine that was EPA compliant. Those were a disaster. It really wasn't the engine but the emissions that was the problem.

 

I wouldn't buy a isx even though some say they average some good mpg. There pretty expensive to open up. I would go for a tuned cat or Detroit and know I'm not driving a bomb.

 

MBN is the developing engine for twin turbo acerts. It only had restrictive muffler that was later added to acert engines.

 

[QUOTE="semi" retired;4001117]Nobody has mentioned the old 2 cycle Detroit's,,,,,worthless junk. Do they still make those? Back in the day, they were very popular. So many jokes were made about those. I drove a Louisville Ford with a 238 Detroit, and you had to drive it like you were mad at it. I was told to slam your finger in the door, to get in the right frame of mind. Once, after a long day, parked it in the shop, it was due for a service, came in the next day for work, my truck was gone. I asked the mechanic where it was, he said, it's getting a new block put in. After they changed the oil, they started it up, and it put a rod through the side of the block. I knew of a guy many years ago, that had a V-12 Detroit, called it , "The Buzzin' Dozen". It was pushing 450 hp, a lot of horse in the '70's, but was always tearing it apart.
Mack too makes a good motor, or at least they did. I drove a R model with a 300+, although, I never thought it was anywhere near 300, as a "shiny 290" Cummins would pass me all day long, but those Mack motors were tough.
Anybody else with an old Detroit story?[/QUOTE]

I dunno bout worthless junk bud...... I made a lot of money with a 318 and a 238. No they don't make them anymore...outlawed cause of emissions but still active in Marine and industrial applications AND a bad 318 will still fetch $2500 in parts.

Hate to date myself but I attended a drivers meeting where drivers were told to take it easy on the new 318's so's not to tear out the driveshaft and a 400BC was an O/O motor.......Good times for sure......I was a pup pushing a broom at a REO dealer for $2.00 hr. ( The $2.00 man ) Got in so much trouble...but had fun and learned from crusty drivers.

jmo

 

Hi chalupa, I apologize, that may have been a little harsh. Out of 10 drivers I know, 9 didn't like the old Detroits. I drove a dump truck for a guy that had 3 trucks, and they all had 238's. I'm not saying people didn't make money with them, there were just better motors out there. The 2 cycles were cheap to repair, the noise was unbearable after a while. I saw one running backwards once. I drove a Mack with a 237 Mack motor, and that had a lot more power than a 238. I'll tell you one motor that was worthless, was a 3208 Cat with no turbo. 318 was a little better, though. In the 35 years I drove, I've sat behind just about every motor, and the 2 cycles were my least favorite. Take care, man

 

NP...no offense taken. I'm simply a money man.....never cared much for prestige gotten from Cats and Petes, only cared about cash. Had Yamahas so bad I had to wrap a gas rag around the air cleaner to get them to start.

Best thing about them was an abundance of cheap parts and a quick rebuild. Me and a bud could rebuild a V8 in a day using Chinese parts. Whole kit was about $1500. Add drinks, lunch and gojo plus incidentals and we're done in 10 hrs and under 2 grand......back to work on Monday with a fresh motor.

You would love a later dog set up correctly. I too started on a one stack Mack with no shack on the back, 237 and 5 speed...good mule. Later bought a CH with a 380. A little slow but would pull 47k of Freon at 75 once rolling......impressive for a stock 380. And again...all about the money.

Got a ISM Cummins now....425 hp and 10 in a binder.....good mule for what I do. Gonna dump the EGR and VGT soon and should be ok in the future.

JMO

 

PHP:

I see nobody has flown the flag for Mack/Volvo yet...

Not sure what they are like now, but I drove a 2002 Mack 460hp with a ten speed. That thing had some traction! Fuel mileage wasnt great, 5.7mpg. But it could pull anything.