Joined
·
2 Posts
Hello all,
Thought it was about time I moved up from creeper status and came out as a legit TitanTalk member. I bought a new '04 Titan in January of '05 and it has been the best truck I have ever owned. Love pretty much everything about it (save the gas mileage), and it has served me well pulling everything from 5 ton trailers to my little pop-up camper. It has taken all my abuse over the years and never let me down.
So here's a little story:
My 7 year old son and I returned two days ago from a 33 day road trip around the country. We put on a little over 7,300 miles. This was our 2nd such trip. During the summer of 2015 we out on 5,454 mile trip over 28 days, that included 10 days in Mexico. As of now I've put 103,3XX miles on the truck. Before this trip I replaced the original spark plugs with iridium plugs, the original shocks and struts with Bilstein 4600 series (love the Bilsteins and highly recommend this) and finally found a descent set of rotors, Power Stop Extreme Truck and Tow (from Amazon). Replaced the serpentine belt back before the 2015 trip. Other than that I haven't had to do anything beyond routine maintenance and a new set of rotors every 2 or 3 yearsish. I hope whoever was the team leader over the braking department during the Titan development phase isn't saying much besides "Would you like fries with that?" in their new career.
So, one day on this trip, father's day specifically, I was doing 70 in the left lane headed north on I-29 in Missouri 2 miles from the Iowa state line when all of a sudden everything went dead. The truck just shut down. I threw it in neutral, hit the hazards and made my way over to the shoulder. Turning the key got a quick turn over of the engine but it wouldn't run. I called road side assistance and they sent a wrecker to come pick us up. That extra $12 a year I've been paying my insurance company was finally worth it. He put the truck on the roll-off and the pop-up on his hitch and got us up the road to a truck stop.
I'll take a second here to give a shout out to the people of Missouri. The tow truck driver was fast and courteous even though he was out on a Sunday, father's day, at 4:00 in the afternoon. And, the Missouri State Trooper that came to look out for us while we waited was a great guy that even kept my son entertained showing him his patrol car while we got the truck loaded.
So, we got up to the Sapp Brothers Truck Shop on Exit 10 in Iowa and they managed to get to the me about 30 minutes after we got there. The truck started initially, ran for about 5 minutes then shut down same as before. They put the reader on it and couldn't get it to connect. These guys were all big truck mechanics and were really at a loss as to where to look for answers on a 4 wheeler. I went to my phone and with the Google's help came across the threads here on TitanTalk which pointed me to the ECM Relay issues others have talked about. We switched the fog light and ECM Relays and voila! The shop only charged me $50 (seemed fair since I tied up one of their bays for over an hour).
We left there and camped in Nebraska City, Nebraska. The next day after trying to find a new relay at O'Reilly's and AutoZone I ended up getting a new relay at the Nissan dealership in Lincoln, Nebraska. All that drama over a $2.35 relay. Imagine my disgust when I called the dealership here at home yesterday and discovered the recall that I had not been notified of.
After I got the new relay in the rest of the trip went pretty smooth, with the truck at least. The story about the trailer wheel almost coming off on the 101 in San Jose or the trailer blow out in 105 degree heat on a back highway in West Texas probably don't belong here.
To those of you who have suffered through this long narrative I'll say a huge thank you for posting all that you post. Without TitanTalk who knows how long I would have been stuck at that truck stop.
Thought it was about time I moved up from creeper status and came out as a legit TitanTalk member. I bought a new '04 Titan in January of '05 and it has been the best truck I have ever owned. Love pretty much everything about it (save the gas mileage), and it has served me well pulling everything from 5 ton trailers to my little pop-up camper. It has taken all my abuse over the years and never let me down.
So here's a little story:
My 7 year old son and I returned two days ago from a 33 day road trip around the country. We put on a little over 7,300 miles. This was our 2nd such trip. During the summer of 2015 we out on 5,454 mile trip over 28 days, that included 10 days in Mexico. As of now I've put 103,3XX miles on the truck. Before this trip I replaced the original spark plugs with iridium plugs, the original shocks and struts with Bilstein 4600 series (love the Bilsteins and highly recommend this) and finally found a descent set of rotors, Power Stop Extreme Truck and Tow (from Amazon). Replaced the serpentine belt back before the 2015 trip. Other than that I haven't had to do anything beyond routine maintenance and a new set of rotors every 2 or 3 yearsish. I hope whoever was the team leader over the braking department during the Titan development phase isn't saying much besides "Would you like fries with that?" in their new career.
So, one day on this trip, father's day specifically, I was doing 70 in the left lane headed north on I-29 in Missouri 2 miles from the Iowa state line when all of a sudden everything went dead. The truck just shut down. I threw it in neutral, hit the hazards and made my way over to the shoulder. Turning the key got a quick turn over of the engine but it wouldn't run. I called road side assistance and they sent a wrecker to come pick us up. That extra $12 a year I've been paying my insurance company was finally worth it. He put the truck on the roll-off and the pop-up on his hitch and got us up the road to a truck stop.
I'll take a second here to give a shout out to the people of Missouri. The tow truck driver was fast and courteous even though he was out on a Sunday, father's day, at 4:00 in the afternoon. And, the Missouri State Trooper that came to look out for us while we waited was a great guy that even kept my son entertained showing him his patrol car while we got the truck loaded.
So, we got up to the Sapp Brothers Truck Shop on Exit 10 in Iowa and they managed to get to the me about 30 minutes after we got there. The truck started initially, ran for about 5 minutes then shut down same as before. They put the reader on it and couldn't get it to connect. These guys were all big truck mechanics and were really at a loss as to where to look for answers on a 4 wheeler. I went to my phone and with the Google's help came across the threads here on TitanTalk which pointed me to the ECM Relay issues others have talked about. We switched the fog light and ECM Relays and voila! The shop only charged me $50 (seemed fair since I tied up one of their bays for over an hour).
We left there and camped in Nebraska City, Nebraska. The next day after trying to find a new relay at O'Reilly's and AutoZone I ended up getting a new relay at the Nissan dealership in Lincoln, Nebraska. All that drama over a $2.35 relay. Imagine my disgust when I called the dealership here at home yesterday and discovered the recall that I had not been notified of.
After I got the new relay in the rest of the trip went pretty smooth, with the truck at least. The story about the trailer wheel almost coming off on the 101 in San Jose or the trailer blow out in 105 degree heat on a back highway in West Texas probably don't belong here.
To those of you who have suffered through this long narrative I'll say a huge thank you for posting all that you post. Without TitanTalk who knows how long I would have been stuck at that truck stop.
