We received a tip e-mail from BangShift reader John Rasmussen that contained a series of photos that literally stopped us in our tracks. The photos, according to the text in the e-mail show a Caterpillar 793 mining dump truck with a very, and we mean, very, blown up motor. As the story goes, the truck was shifted from sixth gear to first gear and that is what caused the 4700ci, turbocharged, 2500hp, V16 engine to completely and utterly come apart as though it were stuff with a small nuclear device.
There are a couple variants of the 793 dump truck, but we can say that the truck, if loaded would have weighed about 850,000lbs when the “bad shift” was made. As you will see in the photos below, the crank looks like it was the “fusible link” in the whole equation and it broke into roughly half a million pieces. The giant connecting rods strewn about, along with the exterior carnage to stuff like the engine fan and what looks to be a bellhousing of some sort is truly amazing.
We do not know who shot the photos or who to credit with them but we do know that we are very glad that (a) we were not driving that truck when it happened (b) we did not have to call the boss and tell him about this (c) did not have to call Caterpillar and ask, “how much for a 78L crate motor”? (d) have to tell the EPA that however many gallons of oil just lubricated the Earth!
Scroll down to see photos of an engine that had a very, very bad day!
Thanks to John for the tip!
A little JB Weld, some rings & bearings and that thing will be good as new
The problem is in the first pic, they used Baldwin oil filters lol
And whats wrong with Baldwin filters?
Not good to use on a cat
very true a factor cat filter is best or wix
See what happens when you don’t give the driver their coffee break on time….
I’m guessing that’s about a $1M engine, If they want they can pick up a used truck-
http://www.machinerytrader.com/list/list.aspx?Manu=CATERPILLAR&MDLGrp=793
Cablam missing pieces everywere.
safe to say the driver is now unemployed
Ya think!
He might not ever got a job driving again.
It looks to me that it was a ” Run a Way ”
The driver had nothing he could do but run like hell !
The machanics are the ones who should lose there jobs for letting it get that bad
Would have been something to see though 🙂
Hell yea I would have over to see it happen
He shifted it from 6th all the way down to 1st.
These trucks can’t shift from 6th to 1st, but you would have to have driven one to know that.
Matt is correct, there should be a downshift inhibitor to prevent 6th to 1st.
my guess would be a malfunction in the transmission. maybe a bad range splitter? highly unlikely that something like this could happen through driver error. these thing are pretty idiot-proof.
your the idiot with a comment like that, a driver must inspect his equipment before and after every shift if there is a mechanical failure the first person to blame is the driver so piss off, sincerely a annoyed diesel Tech
Oh the irony, someone calling someone else an idiot when they don’t even know proper grammer! lmao
Oh the irony! An idiot calling and idiot out over grammar but they don’t even know how to spell grammar!
lmao
Despite the CYA all to apparent in the preceding post, the mechanic/tech’s job is to keep the truck driveable and the driver’s job is to drive it. The narrow issue is simply whether the driver cause a problem that wouldn’t have happened without his error, or that the driver failed to heed such evidence of a problem he should have either stopped the truck or bring it in for inspection.
At the end of the day either the driver or the mechanic/tech could be singly or jointly responsible for the blow up (and in differing percentages of fault), and despite the arm chair jury all around this post, no assignment of responsibility should be made until an investigation is complete
Looks like a couple engines I’ve blown at the local strip. Only more expensive.
How many times are you going to post these shots? You covered this one a couple years back!
Shaddap!
First time I’ve seen them.
Glad they got posted.
ever notice what cuts lose first
jeese what a mess.
Even my sons couldn’t create that mess I hope
Look at the age old Pepsi can in the dude’s hand in the third picture!
I’ve picked up after these engines blow up on the haul road. Nothing like filling 5 gallon buckets full of engine parts and pieces for 200-300 yards!
Had a detroit 8v-92 do a runaway years ago.. Never seen so many fat mechanics run so damm fast…. 6th to 1st…. didn’t know you could do that… And there is nothing like picking up after this kind of mess… It’s like a gernade went off…
Instead of BangShift it was Shift Bang!
I’d put money on the fact, that I bet he don’t have a job anymore!
I suspect that the missed shift is an invented detail, and that this is actually the result of a simple diesel runaway, where the engine is basically running on crankcase oil:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diesel_engine_runaway
A little polish … licka – paint …. licka – paint …. Bob’s yer uncle ….
All the shifting comment are way way off, mine haul trucks are the same as railroad locomotives, the engine powers a gemerator that make electricity to power the wheelsets. there is no transmission, no clutch or driveline the electric motors are built into the rear end assembly. Do not know what caused the engine to come apart like that , probably a runaway. As to Baldwin filters, my 3406E model Cat truck engine has over 1.8 million miles almost all with Baldwin filters, and no filter related problems
You’re an idiot, 793’s come in mechanical drive and electric drive. Mechanical drives make up 99% of all 793 fleets.