I've come to the realization I haven't posted about this particular truck at all. Which I guess is fine because nobody would know about it, but it's pictures are the bane of phone's storage capacity. With that, if you have slow internet, I forgive you.
It's a 1996 Puch Worker G350 TD / 350GDT / WHATEVER TD - unique in that everything is designated "Puch G" rather than being in typical Mercedes G garb. Color's sweet too. It was some sort of Swiss military Alpine truck.
The Toyota that dragged this behemoth down from Canada on a uhaul trailer had 10 years/100k miles removed from it's service life in the effort. The trailer blew a tire somewhere in Indiana - which if you don't know is absolutely the most boring place in Earth. All in all, how the owner of both these vehicles managed the trip without blowing blood vessels in his brain from the experience is a miracle. Me on the other hand - had to come in on a Sunday.......
So the main thing with this truck was to go about a bunch of preventive maintenance to ensure the longevity of the truck. This does have the 3.5L OM603 - which is notorious for bending rods. In most cases, the engines produced around 96 and after have the updated rods and they're good to go. BUT, they have a different problem... just like the red G, the headgaskets let go for the Cyl 1 oil passage. Severity of the failure depends how long it's let go. If it's taken care of preemptively like this one, it won't cause any problems. If it's left to fester and burn oil slowly like what I believe happened with the red one - a sudden failure can occur and pump 8 liters of oil through the exhaust.
Here's what I'm starting with - 315k miles of noble service.
This engine has never had a spa day in it's life, nor has the truck for that matter. That's OK though, she's getting the full Austrian.
There are a few missing clips, worn rubber hoses, etc that will be taken care of as the work in completed. The truck will be relatively maintenance free outside of filter service's and oil changes. Can see the delivery valve holder brackets are missing on the injection pump - WHY?! Irritating to no end when people don't complete their work.
State of affairs underneath the air cleaner
How's this for some quality exhaust work? Broke the stud trying to remove the turbo? No problem, guy, I've got the solution!
Exhaust leak at the manifold flex pipe - I'm attributing this to the additional stresses/vibrations caused by the exhaust bouncing around everywhere. The exhaust brace is attached to the rearward manifold by two studs (both of which were missing).
Progressively stripping her down
fuel pre-filter looks like it hasn't been done in a decade - I can only imagine how the main filter looks internallly.
Turbo out of the way, sure makes life considerably easier doing the motor mounts with it out of the way. In some cases, depending how collapsed they are, they're nearly impossible to do without getting the turbo off the engine.
And here's where I make it a point to skip every major detail regarding cyl head removal as I don't want to lose track of what I'm doing. One cyl head bolt was extremely corroded and it's removal destroyed one of my triple squares...and of course Snap On doesn't want to replace it. Cyl head bolt in question is the one that considerably rusty in the pic below.
So I'll leave this here and write up the next installment once I get my pics and life in order. Figure by the end of the week I'll have enough sit down time to put something up.
As always, thanks for taking the time to read! Comments and feedback welcome!
It's a 1996 Puch Worker G350 TD / 350GDT / WHATEVER TD - unique in that everything is designated "Puch G" rather than being in typical Mercedes G garb. Color's sweet too. It was some sort of Swiss military Alpine truck.
The Toyota that dragged this behemoth down from Canada on a uhaul trailer had 10 years/100k miles removed from it's service life in the effort. The trailer blew a tire somewhere in Indiana - which if you don't know is absolutely the most boring place in Earth. All in all, how the owner of both these vehicles managed the trip without blowing blood vessels in his brain from the experience is a miracle. Me on the other hand - had to come in on a Sunday.......
So the main thing with this truck was to go about a bunch of preventive maintenance to ensure the longevity of the truck. This does have the 3.5L OM603 - which is notorious for bending rods. In most cases, the engines produced around 96 and after have the updated rods and they're good to go. BUT, they have a different problem... just like the red G, the headgaskets let go for the Cyl 1 oil passage. Severity of the failure depends how long it's let go. If it's taken care of preemptively like this one, it won't cause any problems. If it's left to fester and burn oil slowly like what I believe happened with the red one - a sudden failure can occur and pump 8 liters of oil through the exhaust.
Here's what I'm starting with - 315k miles of noble service.
This engine has never had a spa day in it's life, nor has the truck for that matter. That's OK though, she's getting the full Austrian.
There are a few missing clips, worn rubber hoses, etc that will be taken care of as the work in completed. The truck will be relatively maintenance free outside of filter service's and oil changes. Can see the delivery valve holder brackets are missing on the injection pump - WHY?! Irritating to no end when people don't complete their work.
State of affairs underneath the air cleaner
How's this for some quality exhaust work? Broke the stud trying to remove the turbo? No problem, guy, I've got the solution!
Exhaust leak at the manifold flex pipe - I'm attributing this to the additional stresses/vibrations caused by the exhaust bouncing around everywhere. The exhaust brace is attached to the rearward manifold by two studs (both of which were missing).
Progressively stripping her down
fuel pre-filter looks like it hasn't been done in a decade - I can only imagine how the main filter looks internallly.
Turbo out of the way, sure makes life considerably easier doing the motor mounts with it out of the way. In some cases, depending how collapsed they are, they're nearly impossible to do without getting the turbo off the engine.
And here's where I make it a point to skip every major detail regarding cyl head removal as I don't want to lose track of what I'm doing. One cyl head bolt was extremely corroded and it's removal destroyed one of my triple squares...and of course Snap On doesn't want to replace it. Cyl head bolt in question is the one that considerably rusty in the pic below.
So I'll leave this here and write up the next installment once I get my pics and life in order. Figure by the end of the week I'll have enough sit down time to put something up.
As always, thanks for taking the time to read! Comments and feedback welcome!
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