This is a typical procedure for doing a regen on an International diesel engine. In this video it’s the MaxxForce DT. This engine model has been floating around as the top subject for my articles here on the Hub. I’ll tell you something about these diesel engines. They have issues so I write about them to share with others the problems and fixes. This video is one way to show you hands on using a laptop to force an emission controlled diesel engine to go in to a regen.
Regen is short for regeneration which means to clean out the diesel particulate filter and hopefully everything else down the line. The soot that can collect through out the emission system is endless as long as the engine is running. The soot load in the DPF is monitored by the software and comes in handy when checking for power issues.
Just recently one of our V8 Maxxforce 7 diesels had no acceleration out of the gate. There were no codes and the entire operating system showed it was perfectly normal. After checking the basics the only thing left to check was the DPF. A parked regen was the next step in my mind mainly because the low power was smooth when launching but no torque.
This reminded me of a banana in the tail pipe scenario. So after doing a parked regen the soot level came down from 39 to 2 which fixed the problem. The restriction was enough to create a sluggish performance out of the gate. It took 30 minutes to complete the regen and during the process there was black smoke out of the pipe.
Black smoke out of the exhaust is a sign that there could be a faulty DPF. The filter will usually break in to chunks and that means replacement. I just priced out a DPF for our MaxxForce 7 diesels and it was over 1800.00 before tax which is a good price in this market since the average cost is 2100.00 and up. The black smoke out of the tail pipe is basically telling you there is a hole in the filtration material.
The first step is a key on engine off test to check out the operation system then key on engine running to check out injection control pressure and engine brake pressure. Once cleared the regen can be performed with the engine temperature up to operating levels. The NED software is a valuable tool and we would be lost without it. Whatever the cost it’s software that you must have.
