PM Montana
New member
- Joined
- Jan 4, 2020
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Greetings from the other side of the pond! Many of us US diesel owners (3-liter with M40 6-spd "Comformatic") are having serious issues with glow plugs. Typical situation is this: 1. Error code. 2. Bring to Ram dealer. 3. Dealer snaps off glow plug trying to remove it. 4. Ram dealer tells customer it needs a new head (>10,000 US dollars if warranty expired). 5. Wait a month or two. Or three. Or more.
There must be a better way! Some background first. In the US the van is sold by Ram and called a Promaster (PM) starting in 2014. Most are sold with gas engines but some of us opted for the diesel with the Comformatic (as you in UK call it?). However the diesel was discontinued in 2016 for a variety of reasons. Most of us on the Promaster Forum blame Ram (and their dealers!) for their lack of training mechanics and the mechanics general lack interest in this "different" powertrain.
Many owners of these great (in my opinion) vans are scared or running away or both. Those of us without the glow plug problems are crossing our fingers we don't have the problem, and those with issues are paying way too much for a repair (extracting a glow plug) that the Ram Dealer should be able to handle.
So my question for my Ducato mates on this forum include:
1. Are we diagnosing this correctly (reading your threads it seems electrical issues tend to be a bigger problem than actual glow plug failure)??
2. How common is snapping off a glow plug on these 3 liter diesels? I see few complaints on your forum about this!
3. If we need to extract the glow plugs and they snap due to corrosion (or poor American technique) where do I find an extraction tool? We need some here!
I do know there are differences between the Ram and Fiat models but I suspect - and without any evidence - that the glow plugs are identical. Not sure about the glow plug electronics. Probably not.
Thanks mates for all your help and reading through this long-winded message.
There must be a better way! Some background first. In the US the van is sold by Ram and called a Promaster (PM) starting in 2014. Most are sold with gas engines but some of us opted for the diesel with the Comformatic (as you in UK call it?). However the diesel was discontinued in 2016 for a variety of reasons. Most of us on the Promaster Forum blame Ram (and their dealers!) for their lack of training mechanics and the mechanics general lack interest in this "different" powertrain.
Many owners of these great (in my opinion) vans are scared or running away or both. Those of us without the glow plug problems are crossing our fingers we don't have the problem, and those with issues are paying way too much for a repair (extracting a glow plug) that the Ram Dealer should be able to handle.
So my question for my Ducato mates on this forum include:
1. Are we diagnosing this correctly (reading your threads it seems electrical issues tend to be a bigger problem than actual glow plug failure)??
2. How common is snapping off a glow plug on these 3 liter diesels? I see few complaints on your forum about this!
3. If we need to extract the glow plugs and they snap due to corrosion (or poor American technique) where do I find an extraction tool? We need some here!
I do know there are differences between the Ram and Fiat models but I suspect - and without any evidence - that the glow plugs are identical. Not sure about the glow plug electronics. Probably not.
Thanks mates for all your help and reading through this long-winded message.