750K Mile Duramax

[More Power]

751,837 Mile Duramax
A 2005 GMC 2500HD Goes The Distance!

Imagine driving your truck 400 miles today, 400 miles tomorrow, and 400 miles every single day for the next 5 years (that's 1825 days). If you did, your Duramax would have what this truck has - more than 750,000 miles on the odometer. Do we know how long the Duramax can last when used to tow? Click Here!

[Mark Rinker]

Wow. Just simply...WOW.

In keeping with the DOT's hours of service, this (these?) hauler(s) were running right to the edge of what would be possible, and maybe even then some! I'd sure like to see his log books...

That is simply amazing. No injector replacement? We need to find out what oil, what brand of fuel, and what fuel treatments this guy was running!

[More Power]

Yes, I would have liked to talk to the owner to gather more information, but I was told about this GMC a couple weeks after the truck had been traded. The dealership owner told me that they weren't planning to sell this truck, but rather eventually include it as part of a fleet of GM diesel trucks used on a family cattle ranch (I may do a story about the ranch truck fleet later this summer).

I asked a sale manager, the day I shot the photos, what a truck like this would be worth on the used market - considering the miles. He thought it might be worth about $8k. I also checked www.kbb.com when preparing the story, and according to kbb, low book is still at about $16k. Personally, I think the truck has more value to either a GM dealer or to GM coporate types to use as an ad tool. It's a cool truck!

Jim

[Mark Rinker]

Did the truck have an hour meter? If so...how many hours were showing? My guess is 18,500...

[CoyleJR]

Jim,
I posted this last August after seeing another high mileage Hotshot truck. If you take care of a Duramax it will run forever.
John

08-19-2009, 07:22 PM
CoyleJR
Enthusiast Join Date: Dec 2000
Location: Hawaii
Posts: 27

Howes

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Mark

Last week at a rest stop on I 84 in Oregon I talked to a guy that delivers RV trailers. His 2005 D/A, CC, 2x4, DRW has 561,000 miles on it. He uses Shell Rotella 15w-40, and Howes fuel treatment and has never had any problems. He has replaced the water pump, alternator and a front wheel bearing. It sounds like Howes does some good if he could get 561K on the original injectors.
Mark Rinker
Moderator Join Date: Jun 2003
Posts: 4,722

Mileage
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Wow.
Did you actually see the odometer? 500K since 2004 would be 100K per year, or 2000/week, 50 weeks per year....

Thats some hardcore driving.-------------------------------------------------------------

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Mark,

The guy opened the door and put the key in to get the exact mileage. I did see the mileage and it was about 80 miles away from turning 561k. The guy said he was a former thirty year 18 wheeler owner operator before he started to deliver RVs. I told him about The Diesel Page and asked him to post his truck and mileage. He indicated that he would but so far I have not seen anything. There clearly are some very high mileage Duramax trucks out there that are running good. If I get 300k out of my LBZ with no major problems I will be satisfied.

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[arveetek]

I enjoy talking to the trailer delivery fellows here at the RV dealership I am employed at. Most of them drive late model trucks with a few hundred thousand miles, but once in a while you see some unusual vehicles.

We have one driver with a 97 Ford E-350 custom truck with a sleeper, built on an old ambulance chassis. It has the 7.3L Powerstroke, and over 400K miles.

A few weeks ago, we had a fellow drop off a trailer with an old beat up Dodge. It was a '98 model, pre-24 valve. He had over 960K miles on that sucker! It looked like it did, too. Body was pretty rough, and it leaked about every kind of fluid possible onto our lot.

I have never seen such a high-mileage vehicle that looked as good as the one in this story, though. That truck still looks great!

Casey

[More Power]

Did the truck have an hour meter? If so...how many hours were showing? My guess is 18,500...

Since you asked, I asked the sales manager to look at the hour meter for me. He reported that it showed just under 10K. Doesn't quite match the miles unless the truck averaged 75-mph... The owner who traded the truck reported the miles as being accurate. If I were trading a high-mile truck, I wouldn't report more miles than what the truck actually had...

Is it possible hour meters aren't always accurate? Could some prior service (ECM, or other electrical component) produce this result? I don't know. I do know that the instrument cluster records and stores the mileage, and that mileage is kept even after the cluster has been out of a vehicle for long periods. The used instrument cluster I installed in Lil Red showed 1931 miles when first powered up. Clusters can be reprogrammed at dealerships, but this procedure is carefully monitored by law. I had planned to have the dealership zero-out Lil Red's cluster, but it would have been a big deal and required more paperwork. I decided it wasn't worth the hassle.

I reported what facts/photos/GM data were available to me, you decide.

Jim

[Mark Rinker]

Odd. Hard to imagine a scenario where that would happen...

• if the speedo were swapped, then the hours would be swapped, too.
• if the vehicle were towed (engine not running) the mileage wouldn't continue to increase, would it?
• maybe the guy installed tiny little donut tires off a clown car?

Who knows!

[CoyleJR]

Several months ago I pulled both batteries out of my 2006 D/A and the hour meter reset to zero from 4,000 hours. I posted the problem here and several members indicated that they had the same thing happen. Others also posted that they had removed their batteries and the hour meter did not reset to zero. I suspect that the 751k mile truck had both batteries removed at some point and the hour meter reset. It is strange that some trucks reset and some do not. ?????

John

[More Power]

Several months ago I pulled both batteries out of my 2006 D/A and the hour meter reset to zero from 4,000 hours.

Interesting... You can see in the photos that the truck is equipped with ACDelco batts, but they are the combo top/side post variety, which are likely replacements. All new trucks I've seen were factory-equipped with ACDelco side post (only) batts.

Jim

[SoTxPollock]

Interesting to me is a truck with over 751,000 miles on it and the print out says nothing about wheel bearings, or u-joints being replaced, I suppose a lot of work was done in other places not accounted for at the Chevy dealer. Surely brakes and shocks, belts and hoses, etc. What about upper and lower ball joints? So many parts to wear out. Wish we had a better accounting of parts replaced in that 3/4 of a million mile run. Why? Because I would like to know what it will take to make mine run that long. Did it have additional fuel filtration?
Original fuel pump? How many sets of injectors were replaced?

[argo]

Damn! And I was impressed to get 300K from my F-150. She'll make 751,000 but not on the original engine! I don't think I could bear to go that long without converting it to diesel by then!

[spongebob]

Wow I thought I was doing good with 425,000.. ive only replaced a turbo, front wheel bearing and t-stats. Oh I blew the trans, I didnt change the oil.

[More Power]

I just re-read this article. It's a great piece, even if I do say so myself.

https://www.thedieselpage.com/duramax/750kduramaxc.htm

The last I heard, this truck was taken to the dealership owner's ranch in Idaho, where it will live out its life as a ranch truck. The dealership owner wanted to keep it because of its uniqueness and because he wasn't comfortable having his dealership sell it on the open market. Personally, I'd keep it too. If I were him, I'd have it on display at the dealership as a proof statement about the durability of the Duramax. He might have done that if this truck was a Chevrolet... (He owns a Chevy dealership...)

Jim