cat liners

Cat did have some liner flange issues some years back (2003 2004)


PROBLEM

Cylinder Liners may need to be replaced when one fails on certain C-15 Truck
Engines. A machining error can cause the cylinder liner to crack. This crack can
result in the bottom of the cylinder liner separating from the liner flange. This
problem applies to 1599778 and 1979322 Cylinder Liners and cylinder packs
containing these liners.

I've attached the Info.

Mind you there wasn't a lot that failed and 99~100% of those would have been well and truly out of the system by now.

This Problem had nothing to do with Cylinder Block and the Deck face anomalies.

 

I should add this was a problem Cat had way back then and it was a Liner issue in itself.
However as indicated above excessive Liner or uneven liner protrusion due to deck fretting can cause Liner flanges to Crack.
These are two different problems as such but the same final outcome.
(99% of case will be the deck)

Then again I have seen many after market FP Liners crack at the flange..Regardless of the deck but that's a Liner Manufacture problem.

 

First I've heard of this but 2 years ago a friend of mine rebuilt his bridge motor and got several piston packs that didn't have the rings staggered.

Drove him and his mech crazy til they finally figured it out....turned out that Cat sent a bunch out that way.

 

Sleep..........what a luxury

Its not knowledge.........it's OCD

 

As Far_Call posted I doubt these liners are in the system any longer. Now that's not to say that CAT didn't manufacture a new batch of F*&^#$ up liners recently.

the only way you will possibly win an argument with CAT is to have complete documentation showing the liner protrusion of the liners before you installed the head per CAT's measurement requirements. This means you have to have the measurements from the 4 designated spots on each liner per CAT installation instruction in the service manual. If you don't have these records written down on the CAT work sheet for liner protrusion...........you don't have a leg to stand on for arguing these failures in CAT's eyes

 

You say your mechanic has had 5 failure like this, is that in the recent past or over the last 10 years?
If its 5 failure recently I would be looking at his procedures, It is not uncommon to hear of a few random failures but for one shop to see 5 suggests to me there is an issue at that shop that is the root cause.
On the failed liners have the liner seats been cut? If so check if the liner seat cutter blade is parrallel to the deck face, if the cutter blade is at even a very slight angle to deck the you can measure liner heights within spec but the shim seat will have a taper, when the head is bolted on the crush force of the head being bolted down tries to twist the top of the liner causing it to crack.

 

Just saw one like this in our local dealership. I think that it was in #1.

 

Even after all this you will still have to fight with them to get anything. One of Cats biggest failures is customer service.

Tim was telling me something about issues with shims. I thought he said someone on the forum here was posting about it, but I could be wrong... Either way, if you had to use shims you might want to look into it?