DynoRichard "Mad Dog" Madsen's portable chassis dyno was tough on the trucks of Diesel Power Challenge, or more likely, it was the drivers pushing their engine combinations to the ragged edge. A confused manifold absolute temperature (MAT) sensor in the '99 Ford Power Stroke built by Mike Hallas began misreading the intake temperature and sent the truck into a fault mode, which led to dyno runs with just 42 psi of boost. He was finally able to coax enough boost for an Eighth Place run of 858 lb-ft of torque and 516 hp. Ric Scrimager didn't know it at the time, but his '06 Chevy Duramax had started burning the No. 7 piston, and the problem only got worse in the high altitude. Ric decided against using nitrous on the dyno and pulled a respectable 842 lb-ft of torque and 546 hp using only fuel to come in Ninth Place.
Danny Elmore lost his front driveshaft on the dragstrip when the transfer case in his Ford exploded after the chain broke and bound up in the driver side of the gearbox. The front driveshaft was also a victim of the binding forces and was spit out after bouncing under the rear axle. After borrowing a Ford transmission wiring harness from a spectator's truck, Danny was able to run his Decepticon with its new "air-cooled" T-case on the dyno and during the tow test-in two-wheel drive, that is.
Even though his transfer case had changed into an air-cooled gearbox, Danny Elmore managed to pull 1,077 lb-ft of torque and 601 hp, which was good enough for Sixth Place in this event. The turbo in Tony Burkhard's '05 Chevy Duramax suffered catastrophic failure when the compressor wheel disintegrated and cracked the housing. The malfunction sent pieces of aluminum flying into the intake, where some lodged in the valves, and it even flung parts back up into the air filter. He still managed to take Seventh Place by putting down 929 lb-ft of torque and 627 hp before the pop heard 'round RMR occurred.
Randy Hartman had no problems with his engine, but a stuck-open wastegate limited the output from the turbo combination into his heavily fueled 24-valve Cummins. That malfunction, combined with the loss of full nitrous pressure, couldn't stop him from making 1,203 lb-ft of torque and 665 hp, which secured Fourth Place. Shawn Ellerton had no visible problems as he spun his Phat Shaft 62 and HT3B turbos to 80 psi and injected nitrous into his 6.0L. That recipe allowed him to build 1,179 lb-ft of torque and 715 hp and nab Fifth Place.
Micheal Tomac blew an intercooler boot but quickly recovered and took Third Place in the dyno competition with an even 750 hp and 1,300 lb-ft of torque at the rear wheels of his '02 Chevy Duramax. Jorge Alfonso hot-wired his nitrous solenoid to ensure a solid shot during his Second Place run that produced 852 hp and 1,453 lb-ft of torque. James Farnam had two stages of nitrous available for his common-rail Cummins and took First Place with an awesome, Diesel Power Challenge record run of 1,650 lb-ft of torque and 956 hp-and he did it with the first diesel truck he's ever owned.
There have been a few changes made to the '02 Chevy that Micheal Tomac used to win the '06 Diesel Power Challenge East. A set of LBZ pistons cracked, so he's gone back to custom-cut LB7 pistons and CNC-ported heads by SoCal Diesel along with Crower rods and an ATS dual CP3 pump kit he says added 6 mph on his first trip down the track.
Tow TestAfter the dyno competition, only eight trucks were left in the competition. With turbo bits threatening to eat his Duramax, Tony Burkhard called it quits and concentrated on getting his truck ready for a sled-pull competition two days later (which he won). An exploding transfer case was not enough for Danny Elmore to throw in the towel, and his injured Decepticon Ford struggled but managed to pull the 10,000-pound trailer out to the eighth-mile mark in 16.46 seconds at 53 mph and take Eighth Place.
The inability to build full boost kept Mike Hallas and his red dualie in Seventh Place after a run of 15.10 seconds at 60 mph. The torque from his two turbos allowed Randy Hartman to shave more than 2 seconds off that time for a 12.66-second pass at 62 mph that earned him Sixth Place. The single-turbo, common-rail Dodge driven by James Farnam made the eighth-mile pass in just 12.49 seconds at 60 mph, allowing him to snag Fifth Place.
After numerous dragstrip passes and a long dyno session, Jorge Alfonso barely got his tow-test run done in time. His teammate, Enrique Gonzalez, used nearly an entire 15-pound bottle of nitrous spraying the intercooler to quickly cool it down. Unfortunately, a programming adjustment had kicked the truck out of 4WD, so the first pass attempt went up in smoke-literally. With the clock running down, Jorge managed a 11.97-second run at 59 mph, which put him in Fourth Place.
Smoke licked up from all four tires on Shawn Ellerton's 6.0L when he released the brakes and unleashed the boost of his Industrial Injection Phat Shaft 62/HT3B turbos before running the quarter-mile in just 12.82 seconds at 90 mph. He said a pesky intercooler boot popped off at the end of the run, costing him a few ticks of the clock and more than 10 mph from his top speed. | 
Micheal used data-logged information (and some educated guesswork) to build the best tune for the high altitude of Rocky Mountain Raceways (4,215 feet). It paid off when Micheal beat his winning drag time from Bowling Green, Kentucky (elevation 550 feet), and set a new Diesel Power Challenge record for the quickest and the fastest times in the quarter-mile. |
The '01 Dodge Ram built by Randy Hartman started out as a work truck, but after reading about the Diesel Power Challenge, he started this racing buildup in October 2006. His first test runs were just a few months before he was selected for this year's contest. The truck now has a Dynomite Diesel fire-ringed head with ARP studs, a Diesel Dynamics camshaft, an HX40/HT3B turbo setup by PDR, a Spearco intercooler, and a Dynomite Diesel manual assist pump to help the stock VP44 pump get enough fuel to feed the hungry Cummins. | |