How to tell engine health un truck with unkown history

Hello down under! Welcome abroad, I mean, aboard,,best way is an oil and coolant sample to be analyzed. 2 million kilometers is about 1.2 million miles, and if it was never rebuilt, you are clearly on borrowed time. The samples show metal and copper from bearings and coolant for oil. If the truck itself is okay, a rebuild shouldn't scare you, it's probably time anyway. Good luck.

 

Get an oil sample kit, get the sample and send it off. I used to do this for my old Mercedes diesel car years ago. Cost was about $20 about 20 years ago, much more now.

 

Oil test, dyno, and blowby are good starts. Look at hours vs miles around 11-14K per 500k is normal usage. More then that can be questionable. Also keep in mind, shops WILL miss things and if your real unlucky the seller may hide things under paint. Much more likely with how you aquired said truck. So have them check the ECM and engine for major diffrences in odometer, have them check any newly painted areas for hidden wear and/or damage, do a function test on wear parts, have them check the frame for hidden or bondo covered rust damage. Ensure the truck itself is also in good shape and there arent any major problems hidden away.

After that you can also have them scope the bores or do an overhead just to check for excessive wear and tear on it.

 

Take it to Cummins out at Wetherill Park. Get them to put It on their Dyno & give you a Report.. Also they will have records of any Work Cummins Australia have done to It. They are a bit constrained by the Privacy Laws as to what they can & Can't tell You though..

If The Truck Itself is well kept, Then yes It's well worth Keeping..

Just My 2 cents worth..

 

At one time I did work for a man that started trucking when he came back from WW2. He did very well over the years.
Bought the best quality - value used trucks he could find. Replaced all the normal wear and tear stuff. Had the crankshaft bearings replaced and the overhead adjusted. Replaced all the belts and coolant hoses.
Once I asked about a heater hose in the dash. It is only about 3 inches long and those almost never fail if no one messes with them. It takes about 4 hours to change it. Do you really want to do that? Yes all the hoses and the heater valve while you are there.
There were other things to his program but when completed he would put them on the road.

Another company I was employed by bought new trucks. They are no longer in business. Never ran the overhead if there was not a problem. Did engine oil samples on all trucks over three years old. A 5 year old came in with massive blow by and the driver adding lots of oil. It was sent to Cummins for a Now II inframe. Two weeks later we got a call that this truck has to come off the road now!!! Whats up? Oil sample results say ABC XYZ. That is amazing. It blew up 3 weeks ago and we got it back from Cummins 2 weeks ago.
Technology works much faster today. If 100 people answer you question you will get 100 different answers.
As for me if you are not adding more than a gallon of oil a week. Hopefully it is not using hardly any oil for about 12,000 miles then goes to a gallon a week.
That would be a good time for an oil change. If you come in off the road and the blow by tube does not look like a old faithful I would not do the dyno. That money could put bearings in it. If you are using lots of oil and have lots of blow by the dyno is also is also a waste. Pay someone to tell you your engine is worn out?
There is a middle ground in those 100 answers. Is your maintenance going to be proactive or reactive.

 

I should add a bad turbo can cause extreme blow by. Also some engines can run a long time with a lot of blow by if oil consumption is not a major issue.

 

You put 300k on it, you should be able to tell if its good or not.

If oil samples are good, oil pressure is in spec, starts easy in cold weather, doesn't consume excessive oil and pulls good I would just keep running it. Its rare for an engine to just fail with zero warning. Most cases there'll be signs that it's not happy.