Grumpy Bears 2015 Silverado 2WD

[Grumpy Bear]

 Make My Day

 

 

Get out of my truck!

 

Talk about Grumpy! 

[Grumpy Bear]

April Fuel Report

 

5/5/2023

 

570 miles on 25.855 gallons of alcohol mix = 22.05 mpg

25.02 mpg unweighted E-10 equivalent. 

Cost per mile fell from 14.3 cpm to 12.2 cpm. This was due to warmer weather/better mileage and higher alcohol levels/lower blend cost providing leverage. 

 

I have increased alcohol levels slowly in steps adding the minimum 5 gallons per fill E-85; now 53.7% up from the winter blend 42.5%. 

 

Blue is a percent ethanol projection based on 50%- or 13-gallon fills. (normal) Orange is actual at 5-gallon fill-ups. IMO it is better to transition than to crash. 

 

 

[Grumpy Bear]

165,205 Mile Service

 

5/6/2023

 

3,158-mile OCI

No make up. 

 

5 Quarts Red Line HP Euro 5W30 medium SAPs

1 Quart High Performance Lubricants SAE 40 EC

1 PBL22500 filter

Edited May 7, 2023 by Grumpy Bear

[Grumpy Bear]

165,265 Mile Services

 

5/7/2023

 

8 quarts Red Line D6 drop and fill. This should have been done at 150K. Now 97.84% Red Line. Fluid still red and clear but getting darker red. Right at 40K since last drop and fill. Faint hint of drive line lash now going R to D. Really faint.  

 

Balance and rotate tires. Slight vibration is gone. One tire 2 ounces out. The tire that was booted. One other 1/2 ounce out and two front tires were on the money. A little runout in one rim now on right front. Something to watch. 

 

Brake inspection 65-70% of front pad left. Even wear. No taper or scars or grooves in rotors. Pins free. 80 to 85% rear pad left. Even wear and free pins as well. Rotors are mint. 

 

Pepper is right as rain.  Pretty busy next week or two then she needs to get to the dealership for the airbag recall. Something I am not looking forward to. They ALWAYS break something. 

 

 

 

Edited May 8, 2023 by Grumpy Bear

[Grumpy Bear]

Spring Cleaning

 

5/11/2023

Ole girl doesn't look half bad.                                                     

 

Lots of road work in the area and small chips are multiplying like rabbits. 

 

[Grumpy Bear]

May 2023 Fuel Report +

 

629 miles consuming 29 gallons of 70% ethanol for a result of 21.7 mpg. About 13 cents per mile. 

 

After over a year of Dizzy being pretty much a full-time job, Pepper is going to get some love. Rock Auto order today. A new driver's side valve cover with gasket and all hardware, PCV valve and 6 new NGK Ruthenium plugs. I'll get the VLOM oil pressure screen locally as well as the intake air filter. No leaks. Just refreshing the entire breather system. All parts are genuine GM 'Blue box' OEM as installed replacements. 

 

Air bag replacement under recall coming up soon. 

 

 

Edited June 6, 2023 by Grumpy Bear

[Grumpy Bear]

166,419 Services

 

6/12/2023

 

Thank you, Red Line HP! 

 

New drivers side valve cover/PCV valve and as it turned out that bank of coils. The replacement came 'loaded' with the hardware, gasket and superseded coil packs. For $55.79. Pretty cool considering the coils are $20.79 each purchased separately. I now have a few spare coils, a new gasket and an extra PCV valve. What it did not come with was the intermediate fitting for the oil filer cap and the lock broke on the old one removing it. Another trip to the parts counter. This one works fine, just comes out when you don't want it to. 

 

 

Amazingly clean

 

 

I have plugs and the VLOM screen yet to install. Tomorrow maybe. It's break time. 

Edited June 12, 2023 by Grumpy Bear

[Grumpy Bear]

166,660 Services

 

6/15/2023

 

Replaced oil filter tube drivers side valve cover GM part #12668614. Broke the lock tang transfering part to new valve cover. 

 

 

Under hood vacuum and soapy water wipe down. Farmers' fields are now planted. Minty fresh  

[Grumpy Bear]

Cooling Rant

 

Alignment, tire pressure, oil and OCI and cooling are all items I am a fanatic about. Cooling has allot of moving parts.

 

Oil/Gas/Chemical was my living, and it is primarily about heat exchange. Even distillation is heat exchange. As such a large part of what we did, those I worked for spent considerable time and money making sure we knew the topic inside out and backward. Still keep my voluminous library in the basement in boxes. But I'm not giving a class. More of a ramble or rant. 

 

Burn fuel and you get heat. Some makes work which again makes heat. Most of it makes heat. Air cools. Water cools. So does PCMO and ATF. Water is the best cooling medium there is but in a radiator is shares space/volume with some form of antifreeze. An alcohol, or some form of glycol. Ethylene or Propylene. Each of these has a different ability to remove or absorb/reject heat AND does so at a different rates. Everything that is cooled also has this same feature. As simple as that sounds the dynamics are not. Nothing is constant except the physical properties themselves. Everything matters and everything has a sphere of influence. 

 

When you're tooling down the road unloaded at 55 mph you are consuming about 30 hp steady. All is in balance. Step on the gas for a limit change to 70 mph and you change EVERYTHING that isn't a mechanical constant. Like the material the radiator core is made from, or the concentration of antifreeze. That being what it is, the rest changes. Air volume and velocity through the radiator changes. Water pump delivery speed and possibly volume changes. Fuel burned changes and even the efficiency it does so changes. Aero drag and speed effects. Perhaps AFM.  Oil pump speed and volume. Piston jets. Ditto your automatic transmission. Power in and out changes. Pump speed changes. Converter efficiency changes. Slip changes. Air over the power and power transfer cases change. Even the thermostats change throttling positions altering flow volumes. Every bit of this has to be accounted for if the unit it to survive and regulate well. 

 

To do this the engineer needs targets and expected conditions. Targets are easy enough. Standard engineering practice built up over more than a hundred years. Expected conditions not so much. They do try to cover the bases by offering some cooling options. RPO NHT. But is also creates another variable. The end user choice to use it as he ordered/bought it. End users are unpredictable. Now you would think this would mean things are engineered to as wide a range as is possible. They are not and why so? Bean counters and greedy executives who like big bonuses like things on the edge of the cliff. Entire departments 'calculate' this to the nth degree. Even if that were not true the range of conditions a system can cover, no matter how wide, is FINITE. Finally there is the fact that these fluids age and change in use and the equipment as well over time and miles. 

 

Example; I'm currently working with. Transmission TBV.  A temperature-controlled valve with an unusual flow map. Picture a valve and how it works. A pump pushes a medium down a pipe restricted by a valve. Flow increases at the valve opens. In a system that is driven by a positive displacement pump the volume is constant and excess by one method or another bleed off. This second is the TBV. When the fluid is cold the MAJORITY of the fluid is bypassed back to the sump. It does this as the other always open path, through the cooler, has more resistance to flow. As the fluid heats up this valve starts to expand and close the bypass creating more resistance in the bypass circuit than the cooling circuit which other than length of path and size of conduit hasn't any valve in it. This is unlike he Gen 1 SMC oil pump that uses a spring to 'blow off' unnecessary volume or a more complicated strategy of two automated valves balancing two flows to equal one rate. 

 

Why does this matter? Because unlike a centrifugal pump system, such as your home water system which has the most control over the flow during the first half of the valve stroke, the TBV exercises the most control during the last half of the valve stroke/travel. I think this explains the difference in classification of various thermostats. That is the water thermostat is rated by it's 'cracking temperature' because it throttles finest during the front half, versus the TBV rating at "Full Open" temperature because is throttle best on the back half. Mystery solved!! 

 

When GM designed this cooling system it did so around a TBV who's Full Open was 192/194F and we all know they ran much-MUCH warmer than this. The new 158 F valve tells us the original system had surplus rejection capacity, but it does not have surplus 'RECOVERY' capacity. This has to do with temperature delta or differences in the total system. Heat moves fastest when temperature is greatest between the cooling fluid and the fluid being cooled. And the thermal conductivity of the cooled fluid to cooling fluid is greatest and delta thermal capacity the least. It also moves faster when the fluid has intimate contact with the membrane separating the two. That is, no gas in the system.  Confusing right? 

 

Easy, water is a better cooling medium than water and glycol. Esters and PAO's are easier mediums to cool than mineral oils. Create bigger deltas.

 

More later. 

 

 

[Grumpy Bear]

Cooling Rant II

 

I have to keep at this before my thoughts vaporize. 

 

So, throttling and the TBV.  Wax type thermostats have about a twenty-degree F range between "cracking temperature' and "full open" setting the throttle range in the middle of the appropriate end of that scale. Simpler, mid-range is 148 and full open in 158 thus throttle temperature is 153 F. In any event the cooling system then needs to be able to maintain the range. 148F-158F. If not, it is pointless to throttle at all as previously posted data over many years indicates. 

 

Question is, "under what conditions"? The answer is those you operate under in the worst conditions you believe you will encounter. For Pepper this means no higher than 158F on the hottest day while towing nothing and hauling less than or equal to 1/2 ton of cargo, gear and passengers combine. 

 

How's she doing? Not as well as I would have hoped. 90 F days happen here even though we average mid 80's during this time of year which is typically our warmest period. Peaking July 19th statistically at 82F. However, we seem to be able to pull some 90's and 100's out of the hat every year. Today was a 90F day and I ran her for hours today testing speed and heat. 

 

To stay at or under 158 F I was limited to 53 mph into the wind and 50 mph with it to my back. What I wanted to know what recovery from a spike. News is, in that same speed range it will recover. From 60 mph it will not. By 60 mph it continues to climb into the mid 160 range and stay there. If I pass and push it to the mid 170's it will stay there till the cows come home OR I slow or stop. Transmission is not alone either. Oil temp climbs with speed increase and stays put at any speed over 50 mph. Water temperature climbs 5 degrees between 50 and 60 mph. All this of course at 90 F air temperature. On cooler days it behaves nicely. At 80F or lower I can do pretty much as I please. 

 

What are my conditions? 43% Ethylene glycol. Red Line Water Wetter. 170 F water stat. 15 PSI cap. 158 F Trans stat. None NHT radiator and trans cooler package. 3.23 gear. PAO based ATF. Red Line D6. Deep alloy finned 8-quart trans pan. 

 

When I first started playing with this several years ago ATF temps would reach 250 F on a day like today and oil temps not far behind. I have to run 60F on a 90-degree day now to get the oil over 200 F. 

 

While testing today I have the opportunity to 'find' once more the perfect cooling speed. Still between 50 and 55 mph. 53 mph is perfect for lowest temps and fastest recovery. That keeps me off the Interstate during the busy time on a day like today. Problem is that slow speeds also send trans temps climbing. Yea to slow isn't good either. State highway were 53 is tolerated well will send trans temps up 10 to 20 degrees in a small town long 30-35 mph speed limit and take 10 miles or more to recover. Not ideal. 

 

This condition was much worse a few days ago before diluting the coolant and adding the water wetter. Just backing up the glycol added 9% to the cooling capacity. I ran cooler today at 90F than a week ago at 78 F. Improvement but requires adjustments for winter. Not something everyone is willing to do. Cut recovery time by over 30%. 

 

Really need more exchanger area. NHT and a small secondary ATF cooler. 

[Grumpy Bear]

It was a nice day. 

168,562 miles 

 

It was 84 F today with a 5 mph wind. 60 on the Interstate and 53 everywhere else permitted. Seems this is the tipping point temperature for this set up. Hot soak or load the trans to 173 F and it will recover to 160 ish in about 5 miles of open highway at 53 mph. At 60 mph that takes about 40 miles but it does recover. It's whispering, "give me more fluid cooler".  Old girl is a nag. 

 

This cooling system has had a persistent but micro small leak in it that never leaves a drop showing. Has done this for years. Add a few ounces of coolant once a year. Nothing in the oil by UOA. Just a hint of that sweet glycol smell on startup. As I do a concentration adjustment twice a year and each time, I add some Red Line water wetter, I just never did the 150K total swap out of fluid. I could find it with a dye pack and perhaps I should. I got an itch for a new NHT radiator anyway. 

 

Been on alcohol for 14,000 miles as of today and with the recent decline in E-85 price she's running penny for penny per mile with Dizzy her I-4 stable mate. 11 cents. And still about $2 a tank cheaper these last few fills. Not earth shattering but nice to see. If it cost me, I'd continue to run this fuel. The oil at 3,500 miles looks better than gas motors at 1,000 miles. Totally odorless as well. No typical, "Someone's burning tires today", smell to it.

 

Lowest 2K mile economy result since she went tippler. 21.1 mpg. Also most town miles I've ever put on her in a segment. 

 

Last tank I gave it a run at 70 mph and finally found out how guys manage to only get 17 mpg. 16.7 mpg. It actually gets better milage in town running though a drive through that 70 down the Interstate. 

 

Still haven't got around to the plugs and coils.  Still haven't done the air bag recall.  Needs a bath bad. 

 

Oil consumption has slowed to a crawl since the breather system was refit. PCV valve I'd guess. Cover looked new so what affect could it have?  Does that look like it moved? sort of usage. 

 

 

 

I never tire of looking or photographing her. 

Edited July 19, 2023 by Grumpy Bear

[Grumpy Bear]

4,000 Operating  Hours!

42.2 MPH

 

7/21/2023

 

Or 500 eight-hour days in that seat. We are just getting acquainted.

 

7/22/2023

 

Bought a Haynes Manual for her today.

 

 

 

 

Edited July 23, 2023 by Grumpy Bear
additional content

[Grumpy Bear]

Clean that A/C condenser and radiator! 

 

 

Yesterday I cleaned the fins on both after hitting mid 170's and nothing I did would cool it down except shutting down. Today I went for a ride and about 40 minutes into it.... crawling traffic on I-39 in 90F+ heat for about 15 minutes. Road repairs. I don't have Climate Control, but I can mimic it. Recirc, full cold and full fan kicked the fans on as under hood inlet temps climbed past 107 F in minutes and trans temps hit 174 F. Oil actually stated calm and water hit near 200 F. Remember I have a 170 F water stat and 158 F trans stat. Yesterday this would have had me in shut down. 

 

Today this was 20 miles after I cleared the parking lot. This would repeat itself a few times on the state highways and I found fastest recovery at 50 mph but livable at 55 mph. The fins didn't LOOK that bad. They were. 

 

Shortly after this photo it sneaked down to 156 F and just as it did, I exited into another snarl. As frustrating as that may be, it is a normal part of driving. As I hadn't seen it recover like this recently, I thought perhaps it was better than it ever was. What it turned out to be, after consulting my records was, as good as it has ever been. 

 

 

Once it gets off the TBV it is locked in at 67 F over ambient temperature. It really does need more trans cooler. 

 

[Grumpy Bear]

Service Note: Antifreeze checks

 

Metered 397 Mv. 0.397 volts hot. 

 

40% by Refractometer. 

 

PH was between 8.5-9. New is @ 8.5. Litmus test strips.

 

Edited July 29, 2023 by Grumpy Bear

[Grumpy Bear]

170,300 Mile Service

 

7/29/2023

 

5,095-mile OCI. Ran a little over this time. Just too hot to work outside. 

No makeup oil. Still well up the hash marks. 

 

5 quarts Red Line HP Euro 5W30

1-quart High Performance Lubricants SAE40-EC

1 FRAM XG10575 Filter (Finally ran out of Purolator BOSS filters) 

 

5,372 miles / 252.68 = 21.26 MPG. 

 

The oil I drained was near odorless. The color of varnished mahogany. Slick as deer guts on a brass doorknob. 

 

 

 

 

Pecking away at cleaning and chip repairs. 

 

 

 

 

Edited August 9, 2023 by Grumpy Bear
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