skip

Gday fjh how are you mate? Ive got a popping sound coming from my 285. It does it when you start it both when its hot and cold. It doesnt seem to be ticking and the pop seems to go out of it when you rev it up. Any ideas? Would it be worth measuring the lift of each push rod?

Thad, sorry to interrupt mate but I couldnt agree with you more on the new models. Our current models; the CH, vision, trident, superliner, qantum and titan are all being pushed aside. The qantum was the first to go, as Volvo will take up the cabover market. We hav 2 of them and they are a nice truck. But Mack are backward to have ever dropped the Ultraliner. They were the answer to kenworths cabover. They are a mile better truck.The vision is the only new model to keep the same shape and theyre calling it a granite. The new trident looks like your granite but has the MP8 under it. Its probably the pick of them as far as looks go. The new Titan looks terrible, it is supposed to be the toughest and hardest looking truck on the market and theyve turned it into a cross between a kenworth and an iveco, its very disappointing. There was nothing wrong with the current models, in fact they were selling well and looking like a mack should look and theyve just fucked it up really! I reckon if they offered the 500hp engine in the trident it would be perfect, because they were only available with a 470CCRS engine. This shouldve been done 5 years ago. Its very hard to follow their thinking. The same thing happened when they dropped the classic superliner II in 1990 and brought out the CLR. There is nothing wrong with a CLR but when you hop out of a big old square superliner it just doesnt have the same appeal getting into a curvy looking truck. After a few years they brought out the titan which was squarer and tougher looking and they were a lot more successful, although a lot of the market had been lost to kenworth. Maybe kenworth marketers should be employed by Mack! Thier range of trucks hasnt changed much in 30 years but they are market leaders out here. Sorry to ramble on mate. Hope there is something relevant in there. Cheers.

Gday moose. Doesnt sound like youre goin too well. I can sympathise a little, maybe not to your extent though. I bought an R615 still with the END864 in it- a bit of a colloectors item out here. It wouldnt fire up for me, but with ether it would go start and run like a dream. It had good oil pressure and didnt breathe heavily. I got it home and did an oil change only to find water in the oil. It had been sitting for a long time so I put a couple of lots of oil back in it and flushed it. This appeared to be working until I tried to start it for a 4th time and the starter jammed, or so I thought. Thinking it had hydraulic locked i removed injectors and tried to remove any fluid from the liner. It didnt move. I removed the sump and in doing so discovered a crack and a piece chipped out of the back of the block, hidden by the starter motor. Then once the sump was off I found it had picked up a main and locked up. The engine is out now and the crank has been ground and block repaired. I got the fuel pump checked and its buggered. Its a rotary and nearly impossible to find replacement parts for. You cant beat old trucks! If it were anything else but a Mack I wouldve gone mad by now. Stick with it mate, hopefully the light at the end of the tunnel isnt an oncoming train! Cheers

It looked like the engine had been sitting in a dam. There were no dust seals on the top of the injectors. The truck had been used as a runabout at a saw mill and between the intake, water manifold and the injectors and their recesses was just baked on saw dust and wood chips. I havent seen many bad ones but that has to take the cake

I know where you're coming from mate. My brother had an Ultra Liner with a 12spd and the gear linkage was fairly heavy and slow which seemed perfect for shifting. There always seemed to be a bit of a tingle going form 4D to 5L, it just had to be a bit slower. Now hes got a superliner and it seems very hard to get a smooth shift in 4th and 5th. And when you grate a gear you know all about it! Im not much of a driver but he goes alright and still has the same trouble

How are you Adrian? I used the gaskets with a light smear of blue silastic on both sides. Too much silastic will push the gasket out and try to split it. Id just fix the leaks and run it and go from there. It may have had a blocked breather at some stage. The crankcase pressure would have to be pretty severe to blow out that gasket. There is a clamp on a bolt for a water hose as well, it may have been loose or removed at some stage. Havent picked her up yet. It did come from mack newcastle originally but that was probably over 12 months ago. A mate of Dads in Albury bought it to restore it but recently passed away so Dad wound up with it. I think I know the truck you're talking about, 237 6spd? It looks very neat and the motor has been done up in their shop but old mate wanted 25 grand for it. Its still only an F model with a 237. I dont think he had too much idea he tried to tell me it had a quad box in it. Theres a truck show in Melbourne next week at Sandown. Have you heard of it? Mostly good old gear there

That seems to be an effective way of gettin them out Rob. I had one recently where i pulled all 6 injectors in half. The heads were off and I ended up pressing them out with a hydraulic press. They were the worst Ive seen, 3 of the injector tubes pressed out with the injectors

Those gaskets seem to get very hard and brittle. They never get looked at so theyve probably been on there since day dot. Mack dont make a gasket they list a tube of silastic as the part number. Gleemans(PAI) list a gasket. If there was too much crankcase pressure the front and rear seals would probably let go first. Thats what happened to our F model. Also we had a battle trying to keep tappet cover gaskets in it. Does it use oil? It could be your compressor blowing past the rings

Were there many of the ENDT864s(twin turbos) around? I think there were only 2 or 3 that came out here to Australia in F models- F719RS. Ive seen a picture in the US of an R719. Out here the END864 was rated at 255hp, then in the R models they wre called an END864A and were rated at 284hp, and that was between '65 and '67. There were only 25 V8 R models out here and I think only 35 V8 F models, so it was a fairly limited run. The 865/6 were quite a popular motor though.

Thats pretty well spot on mate, the 575 and the 610 were a VMAC2 and had the electronic accelerator pedal, and were available in the Titans(which I dont think you had over in the states) up until about 2000. That was the last of the V8s. A very sad day. By far the best sounding engine ever made and nearly the best performance,-pre electronic engines anyway.

Thanks very much James. I will have to start hunting around. Im a way off putting it back together but thats very handy to know.

Thanks old mate Ill run the number by the local dealer. Did you have to use the reamer? I should be able to get away with using new bolts on existing holes toward the front but since Im shortening it to original length the back will want some attention. cheers

Also the manual lists the reamers and their part numbers, J-26461 or similar. Is that a Kent Moore number? Cheers

Thanks Chuck, I found the body bound bolt section in an old manual here. So far on mine Ive found the rear suspension and the front hangers have used these bolts. Because the chassis has been lenghtened and the the truck has been genarally bodged up Im not sure how many parts need these bolts. The manual doesnt say, do you know if anywhere other than the suspension needs them?

Thanks mate, and everyone else who has chipped in too. Can you buy the stepped shank chassis bolts anywhere or will they be a special order? Im going to use all new bolts because there are different bolts everywhere along the chassis. Someone along the line somewhere has attempted to do the truck up but its just a disgrace, its quite possibly the roughest job ive ever seen on a truck. They mustve been in a hurry. Cheers all

That sounds fair. Do you have any thoughts on splitting them? I want to keep the rails because its a very rare truck out here. cheers

Thanks old mate. My chassis is completely stripped, no cab or body, suspension, driveline etc. Im a bit worried about actually getting the 2 rails apart. Someone down here said there is a good chance that I will damage the inner rail removing it from the outer, because of the amount of rust and growth between them. Would it be helpful if I tacked the cross members to the inner rail and supported them, and then try to pry the outer rail out? Was yours the black DM with a red chassis?

It will expand and contract to a certain extent with the difference in temperature of the fuel coming back from the engine. The tank is also a cooling vessel as well as storage

Interesting mate. I wouldve thought there should be a breather on the drivers side as well. My only theory is that the build up in pressure has caused the push of fuel to the passenger side, because its vented. Sorry if this seems blatantly obvious. If its only returning to one side and its not vented then I dont think it has any option but to pressurise. If anyone can shed some light on this it would be great. Cheers.

Gday how is everyone? Im trying to restore an R615RS. I bought it as a rigid tipper but I want to make it back into a prime mover as it was originally, and restore it to new condition. The chassis rails need splitting as there is a bit of growth between them and it is parting them. Ive never done this before and would appreciate any info if someone has done it. Just the best way to go about it, any helpful hints or where I could run into trouble. Thanks everyone in the hope of hearing something, cheers.

Sorry mate Ive been out for a couple of days, Why is your gearbox fallin out? Your mounts mustve been worn? Sounds like you may need to sling a rear support across the top of the box like a Roadranger. Ive seen a similar result on a V8 with a quad box. The bolts came loose and it fretted and chipped the back of the flywheel housing where it mates against the block. As for jumping out of gear our F model was doing it, it has a 15spd roadranger, we put a heavier detent spring on top gear selector and replaced the mounts and it solved our problem. Obviously the lenngth of the gear linkage had a bit to do with it. Be interesting to hear from you mate. Cheers

Unlikely the fork. The fork will wear a little which will cause the dog clutch to not throw in as far and the teeth will round off, so as soon as the load comes off it, it wants to jump out, but the culprit will be the dog clutch. But I did have a bolt come loose on the shift rail on our X1070 2 stick and it wouldnt select reverse properly.

A superliner is an R700, not an R600. You couldnt fit an E9 in an R600. The superliner has a bigger radiator and bonnet and the cab is set further back, and on the Mk2 version it was also raised to increase air flow. Other than the E6 a Cat 3406A and B was the only engine offered in the superliner out here, and with a Horton fan could not be fitted into an R600. Otherwise, yes same chassis, driveline and cab. Ultraliner is a non steel cab cabover released out here in about 1984, slightly earlier in the USA i believe. The last of the Mack cabovers. Out here they were only available with E6 and E9 engines, but in the USA were available with Cummins and Detroit also. They had a grille similar to a CH/R, but it extended the width of the cab. Finished up out here in 1991 were re-released in 1993 as a series 2 and went until about 1999. They were known as an MH model in the states, and an MHR out here, or commonly as an Ultraliner. There is a couple of pictures of our Ultraliner in my gallery.