That moment a fuel line let go on I-10 outside Phoenix at 3am

I was hauling an reefer load through 110 degree heat when the #6 injector line cracked and sprayed diesel all over the exhaust manifold, and I barely shut it down before the whole rig went up in flames.

2 comments

2 Comments

casey_torres6015d ago

Was that a Detroit or a Cummins that cracked the line... seems like those injector lines always fail right when you least need it. Did the engine actually get shut down clean or did you have to dump the air to kill it quick?

hart.taylor14d ago

Are you sure about that? I've worked around enough old two-stroke Detroits to know those injector lines can be a real pain, but I've actually had more trouble with Cummins PT pumps starving an engine than a cracked line ever did. With a Detroit, you can usually just pull the rack or hit the fuel shutoff and it stops pretty clean, even if a line splits. But a runaway Cummins, especially if the turbo seals go, that's a whole different monster where you have to think about an air shutoff or a CO2 bottle. I've had a 6-71 with a pinhole in a line that just dribbled fuel and still ran smooth enough to get the load down before I killed it, so I think it depends on the break. What happened with yours?