Keith Browning Posted September 12, 2013 Share Posted September 12, 2013 This is a good one. Parked outside my shop I have a 2011 F650 with a Cummins ISB engine. No crank condition - the starter turns but does not engage the flywheel. A quick inspection revealed that the ring gear on the flywheel has cracked and separated. Simple.The flywheel is part of the Cummins engine which is warrantied for 2 years, unlimited mileage. Here is the fun part.The truck was built April 8, 2011. OASIS shows the warranty start date as October 21, 2011 BUT Cummins declined to repair it under warranty because the engine warranty is expired. THEY show an in service date of April 21, 2011 which would make the truck out of the two year timeframe, but the customer actually bought the truck in October which puts it within the two year warranty.The truck has 960 miles on it and the customer is PISSED. I am waiting to see what Cummins says about this in service date discrepancy. It is not right.-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------The rest of the story - this is just an awesome example of the state of our industry.Truck was towed to a different Ford dealer on the east coast of NJ. The technician threw a starter motor at it under the Ford warranty, which did not fix the truck. Apparently, this tech never ran OASIS because if he had he would have received the SSM about ring gears separating, referring him to a Cummins TRP and stating it needs to be repaired by an authorized Cummins repair facility. This suggests a known problem. It also suggests that the technician SHOULD have removed the two inspection plugs in the flywheels housing and checked for a loose ring gear. Apparently he did not. He replaced the starter and in the process never bothered to inspect the flywheel while he had the starter out.The truck is then towed to Cummins where the truck is inspected and the electrical connections are checked, the ECM checked for codes but no mention of the flywheel at all on the invoice, the invoice where the customer was charged $425 for diagnosis and was told "it's not our problem." Not sure what that statement means other than it's out of warranty and we are not repairing it. The customer declined whatever repairs that were suggested which was not printed on the invoice so I have no idea what they determined. I can only hope they discovered the flywheel issue.The truck, for whatever reason is towed to my dealer and yes, for whatever fucked up reason WE are the bad guys. Really? I ran OASIS and then READ IT. Spent 5 minutes inspecting the ring gear and verified it is loose then reviewed the paperwork and discovered the warranty start date discrepancy. A call has been made to our Cummins Rep. and we are waiting to see how this one ends. And to make matters more complicated: my floor transmission jack has been broken for years despite bringing this problem to the attention of two managers in the past.I am tired of this shit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alex Bruene Posted September 12, 2013 Share Posted September 12, 2013 Although we are a Cummins certified dealership, we still refer most of our work to Cummins of Eastern Canada. Cummins is a huge pain to deal with, and if you think Ford warranty times are bad, you ain't see nuthin'! I believe they only pay us in the area of $70 per hour for warranty. We also see tonnes of issues with work we send to Cummins. If you send something there with a concern, a few days later you'll get a call saying it's finished, and the bill is $3000... No call for authorization. Nothing. Total pain, and not worth it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
exmod110 Posted September 12, 2013 Share Posted September 12, 2013 Alex, In Manitoba we have a new provincial reg from the powers that be requireing shops to give an estimate, require authorization before any work can be done. Bill can not exceed the estimate by 10% and must have a 90 day warranty..... Not too sure how i think about this one yet...... http://web2.gov.mb.ca/bills/40-1/b012e.php Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brad Clayton Posted September 12, 2013 Share Posted September 12, 2013 The shop I am at now used to be Cummins certified, and they dropped the whole deal due to what is being stated here about warranty issues. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keith Browning Posted September 13, 2013 Author Share Posted September 13, 2013 The Cummins Rep wants to go by the vehicle registration date. Fair enough. Now, the registration card is not in the vehicle and the "contacts" for the company who own the truck have no idea where it is. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DieselD Posted September 16, 2013 Share Posted September 16, 2013 Keith, I have run into this issue several times with our company. We buy the truck from a body builder in Iowa and someone down the line at the body builder forgets to fill out the paperwork showing when the truck was actually purchased and delivered. The last one I did was a international with a cummins engine. It had a SCR failure and the international dealer wanted $6000 to fix it. I questioned the warrenty start date as I knew when the truck was delivered to us. Its a $300,000 truck so I know we didnt park it in the yard for 6 months before using it. Because the body builder did not submit the paperwork to cummins showing the completion date we got stuck with the date of sale being about 3 months piror to us taking delivery. I needed to gather all the paperwork showing when the truck was built and submit it to the international dealer which made a call to cummins to correct the date which had no issues doing so once we proved delivery date. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DieselD Posted September 16, 2013 Share Posted September 16, 2013 I find this true with alot of the larger truck shops out there. I give them instructions to call me for authorization before any work is done and yet the only call I get is to come pick it up with the bill. Big mistake on their part because without authorization from me the bill does not get paid. I had a freightliner dealer pull that crap with me and they ended up out $9k for throwing a bunch of parts at the truck trying to fix it. Im sorry but when is it the customers responsibility for a dealer to pay for your shop techs stupidity?? Some of these places think they can get away with anything because we just need our truck back on the road no matter what the cost. I thought the ford,chevy,dodge dealers where bad enough but they are saints compared to the large truck market..... We also see tonnes of issues with work we send to Cummins. If you send something there with a concern, a few days later you'll get a call saying it's finished, and the bill is $3000... No call for authorization. Nothing. Total pain, and not worth it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keith Browning Posted October 4, 2013 Author Share Posted October 4, 2013 What a debacle. But it is all settled and the truck is finally repaired. We were told to use the Ford warranty start date as the vehicle was titled at that time. Technically my first successful Cummins warranty repair and claim - I did fine with the process. The ring gear itself was good and the welds were all perfect. It appears that the welds broke off of the ring gear and in comparing the new one side by side it appears to be made from a different metal. Of course the truck now cranks and starts... the check engine light was on. An ECM calibration update and a DPF regen to validate the repair we have a go! I was hurting from this one as I could only lift the truck a few feet - enough for a jack to grab the trans but not high enough for me to stand. 4 hours under the truck on a stool and I was really stiff at the end of the day. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aaron Posted October 5, 2013 Share Posted October 5, 2013 Aww man that looks a lot like no fun at all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keith Browning Posted October 5, 2013 Author Share Posted October 5, 2013 I probably would have been even less fun if I HAD to use my transmission floor jack which is not working hydraulically. As much as sitting on a stool all day sucked I am not well suited to working on the ground anymore. My guess is that by the time the dealer gets around to fixing that jack I will be long gone... and I am not necessarily looking for a job so that should tell you how things are these days. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alex Bruene Posted October 5, 2013 Share Posted October 5, 2013 Even though we're a Cummins dealership, we don't get in to anything like that. We're more interested in Cummins handelling their shitty jobs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brad Clayton Posted November 25, 2013 Share Posted November 25, 2013 This particular lift is awesome for doing 6.0L engine work. You simply lift the rear lift as high as your comfortable with and leave the front lift down and the engine bay becomes a flat wall in front of you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.