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NTC 400

dieseldog5.9

dieseldog5.9

Senior Member
Joined
Aug 11, 2014
Messages
614
Location
New Hampshire
I have heard that the 400's were a rugged engine, with a good bottom end, strong jake brake, and the good parts availability and price.

However they are hard to start in the cold, and being fixed timed they smoke bad when started cold. I have heard this was cured in the 444 with STC, or MVT.

Can those systems be adapted to 400 using 444, or n14 parts?

400's had a low compression ratio, did this carry on to the 444?
 
mekanik

mekanik

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Aug 20, 2015
Messages
957
Location
Canada's Northwest
The 444 were a problematic engine. They had injector problems and piston de-bond failures.
The top two rings in the piston were in a steel insert cast into the piston. The insert would work loose and cause
a piston failure debris would take out the turbo and go back into the intake and into the adjacent cylinder.
The N14 mechanical had injector issues as well. The NTC400 was a reliable engine.
 
Truck Shop

Truck Shop

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Dec 7, 2015
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mekanik said:
The 444 were a problematic engine. They had injector problems and piston de-bond failures.
The top two rings in the piston were in a steel insert cast into the piston. The insert would work loose and cause
a piston failure debris would take out the turbo and go back into the intake and into the adjacent cylinder.
The N14 mechanical had injector issues as well. The NTC400 was a reliable engine.
Click to expand...

That's quite true about injector issues at the beginning, but by using OBC method and setting N14 injectors to 125 in-lbs, 444 at 105 in-lb and NT88 at 90 in lb most of those issues disappeared.
As far as the 444 piston issues--Yeah that was a big one for Cummins. But the period from BCIV's to the NT88/444 was a bad time for Cummins. The BCIII were the best CPL's, the filthiest
of the BC's was the BCII CPL 449 very EPA unfriendly. Funny thing is it's what powers my 60 Mack.

007.JPG 004 (3).JPG
 
Truck Shop

Truck Shop

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mekanik said:
I rebuilt a lot of NTC400 Cummins 449 was my favorite CPL timed to .072" and 250 PSI fuel
pressure they pulled good and lasted 10,000 hours if serviced properly. Oil changes every 200 hours.
Click to expand...

449 is a good engine, I find it interesting you time to 72, I also timed them to 72 and the book says 65.
 
mekanik

mekanik

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Messages
957
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The original CPL manual that was printed when the 449 was new said to time it at .070.
The later CPL manual was revised to .065. I suspect maybe to clean up the blue smoke at cold start a bit.
Timing at .070 they pulled a little better at the low end.
 
Truck Shop

Truck Shop

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Thanks petepilot!---As I suspected your 444 3025518 and both the 3025517 and 3801668 are all basically the same. Cummins used the 444 STC cam in the 450hp CPL 1193 engine.
 
T

Tenwheeler

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Dec 15, 2016
Messages
870
Location
Georgia
Truck Shop said:
Yeah that's the one the 315, and it didn't prove out like Cummins thought. Truth was it turned out to be a gutless dog. I was thinking it was a 365 and I do remember some of those
tagged as Formulas, and those weren't much either. C. R. England bought a bunch of those and couldn't keep them out of the shop.
Click to expand...
At least the 315 would continue to race the rabbit. Shop I was working at received one of the first 365s on the market. It always made it home but turned heads when it came in knocking and hammering sometimes. Then straight to Cummings. That lease truck ran off a customer.
The later model 365s did much better but they are still STC.
Not my first choice but I have seen some STCs that would really get it done.
 
Rod78

Rod78

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Joined
Mar 23, 2019
Messages
70
Location
Manitoba
When I tore down the 475 I found the camshaft part number 3021589....is that even the proper cam for that engine?
 
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