Freeze plug solutions? What say you????

fwiw, I picked up wicked diesel's kit, and it's pretty much top notch.

The new kits have a billet spacer below the thermostat housing instead of tapping the housing. The pics on wicked's site don't do the kit justice at all.

COOLANT BYPASS
 
I believe that a clipped water pump and a bypass will help lessen the severity but it will not eliminate the problem. Its a bandaid at best.
 
Wrecked Lil Red Cummins Express on Friday night. Ran its best run ever and lost it in the traps. Guess what blew the freeze plug closest to the cab and dumped coolant on the track and lost it at about 130. Was emailing with Haisley machine about getting the better plugs 2 days before the even. Imagine the luck all it had to do was make it this weekend and I would ahve installed the new ones.
 
Glad you are ok. I think I'm going to give one of those electric pumps a try. Put it on a switch, so i can Run the pump with the truck off if need be.
 
Has anyone tried "staking" the freeze plugs with a small drill bit and a machine screw?

What about removing the freeze plugs and installing new ones with locktite or some type of permanent adhesive?


Just thinking out-loud here, it seems that maybe the water pump has nothing to do with the failure. It seems that the high cylinder wall heat is superheating the water in the coolant jacket and causing it to rapidly expand. The real fix may be to figure out a way to better route the flow of coolant, possibly tapping the block and creating a new route that will promote more flow through the back half of the block.

VMax, did you lose a freeze plug when you lifted or was it still WOT when the plug blew?
 
Big Blue24 said:
Has anyone tried "staking" the freeze plugs with a small drill bit and a machine screw?

What about removing the freeze plugs and installing new ones with locktite or some type of permanent adhesive?


Just thinking out-loud here, it seems that maybe the water pump has nothing to do with the failure. It seems that the high cylinder wall heat is superheating the water in the coolant jacket and causing it to rapidly expand. The real fix may be to figure out a way to better route the flow of coolant, possibly tapping the block and creating a new route that will promote more flow through the back half of the block.

VMax, did you lose a freeze plug when you lifted or was it still WOT when the plug blew?
Click to expand...

I was still WOT when it blew.
 
the water pump has everything to do with it along with heat being another causing factor
 
We thought that the cold temps in Dallas (around 50 degrees) might have loosened that plug enough to possibly blow it out. 1st time to run the truck at this power level in the cold.
 
TMONEYDIESEL said:
the water pump has everything to do with it along with heat being another causing factor
Click to expand...

How much pressure do you estimate the water pump is capable of producing?

I suspect someone could rig up an electric motor to turn the water pump up to 4500 rpm and see how much pressure it can make.

Or maybe someone with an unmodified waterpump and gear train to turn 4500 could tap one of the rear area plugs and get a psi reading.
 
Just found this thread. Since no concrete solution was posted, I figured I'd throw in my $.02
For years I have drilled a 1/16 pilot hole in my thermostats to reduce thermal shock as the engine warms up and the thermostat opens for the first time.
Now, I know that's not a huge hole that will fix the apparant issue, but it might at least help. Any thoughts?
 
impmouse said:
see the plug i'm talking about
Click to expand...
I realize this is an old thread but I just noticed these pictures in it!
Do you think the pressure is what cracked and blew your block out? I cracked my CR block last year but have never determined what caused it. I just figured it was a bad casting.
 
In my case the problem never reared it's ugly head till we started spinning the engine @4000 rpm. clipped water pump and had a failure again as well. Have installed the electric water pump and gutted( took the center section out) the thermostat, have not had a problem their since.$.02
 
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