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I have an Air Dog II 4G 165 lift pump which contains a fuel filter and water separator, and a factory fuel filter with an integrated water separator, on my truck. The lift pump is an aftermarket component I added to help extend the life of my fuel pump (CP4, which I’ve since replaced with a CP3) and provide additional filtration and water separation, especially since I’m using an in-bed fuel tank.

On our way home from Indiana last month, I received a DIC notification for “Change Fuel Filter” and noticed a sudden loss in power while passing someone on the highway. The issue went away after a couple miles, and at the next stop I noticed that my lift pump motor was making additional noise. I figured we picked up some bad fuel at one of the stops, but went ahead and drove home since the filters seemed to do their job and catch the contaminants, at the expense of fuel pressure/ capacity. When we arrived home I changed the auxiliary filter on the lift pump and noticed that it helped, but did not entirely solve the issue with the pump motor noise. So I went ahead and ordered a replacement factory fuel filter (fuel flows into the water separator -> lift pump fuel filter -> factory fuel filter) as well as a new water separator. When I replaced the water separator, the lift pump returned to a normal volume – even though I had drained the water out of it, I guess it was clogged. Since I was working on the truck anyway, I opted to go ahead and replace the factory filter. I installed it and then the truck hesitated to start. That is a symptom of getting air in the fuel system, so I tried to bleed out the air, but the issue kept returning after 1-2 starts. I ended up buying another factory fuel filter (since they come with the seals) and replacing it again, thinking that was the issue… but it did not fix it. After that didn’t check out, I pulled the O-ring from the bleeder screw, and found a very small sliver missing from it. I bought a five pack of those bleeder screws, including the O-rings, for $15 from the auto parts store down the street, and that worked. I’m keeping one of the others in the truck as a spare from now on.

I ended up cutting the old filters open on my bandsaw and found dirt in the water separator and AirDog fuel filter, but the factory filter was clean. My best guess is that one of the diesel holding tanks at one of the stations we stopped at ruptured and had soil contamination. I’m not sure where we picked it up, because we topped off the 51 gallon transfer tank at several stops, and fed the main tank from that, to keep us from having to stop for fuel at any inconvenient time. With 87 gallons of fuel capacity, accumulated from 15 or 25 gallons at a time, it could have come from any number of sources.

The other day I mentioned that my truck’s reverse lights were constantly on, and wouldn’t turn off. I checked all sorts of things and ruled out everything from the headache rack, to the in-bed 7-pin adapter, rear bumper, trailer cabling, and connectors. I found water in some of the connectors and thought that was the issue, but removed them and isolated the wires, and the issues continued. I pulled fuses from the fuse box that should have turned the lights off, but they remained on. Eventually, I decided the issue had to be with the fuse box, and that I wasn’t going to mess with that. Unfortunately, I can’t really believe that the dealer would take care of this under warranty, because there are a ton of things I’ve done to the truck that would likely be blamed. So I really wanted to solve this myself.

I suspected was the fuse box, but didn’t want to get that far into it. Ultimately, I decided to pull it today. This is the box sitting on my desk:

I disassembled the box down to the bare circuit board and inspected it for visible damage. There wasn’t any, so I used a multi-meter to probe around for anything that didn’t make sense.

When everything checked out to be what I estimated to be correct, I moved to reassembly. I tested each of the fuses with a multi-meter instead of blindly replacing them, and found a couple with high resistance, so I replaced those. Then I moved on to the relays, and all of them tested fine except for the fan clutch relay, which is completely dead. Upon reinstalling the box, I checked that the fan was running, then removed the relay, and found it no different. I’m guessing that it’s designed to fail in such a way that the fan clutch remains engaged if the relay is bad. I ordered a replacement off Ebay ($21, though the dealer wants $35) and it will be here on Wednesday. Among other issues, I found that the 30A micro J-CASE fuse that provides +12V power to the trailer is blown, which explains why I had some of the battery issues a while back. When I couldn’t find the the right size fuse at an auto store or on Amazon, I looked online and found that it’s an odd size, with a GM part number, and that a lot of people seem to recommend carrying spares if you tow a lot. They tend to go often. Again, Ebay to the rescue. Something like $2/ea from a dealer and I ordered two.

With the fuse box ruled out, I almost gave up, but had the idea to disconnect the backup camera that sits inside the tailgate. I’ve moved it around from OEM tailgate -> Fifth Wheel Tailgate -> New Tailgate (different, upcoming post) and figured it might have gotten damaged. Sure enough, when unplugged, the reverse light goes out, and lights operate as expected.

I ordered a replacement camera off a dealer on Ebay for $115, and went to Amazon and spent another $100 on all new 7-Pin connectors and wiring for under the truck. Even though they weren’t the issue, I don’t trust them now that they’ve been filled with water and began to corrode, and would rather play it safe and replace them than lose my trailer breaks while heading down the highway. Those parts should be in this weekend.

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There is still the issue of an outstanding recall on my truck, which is a software flash to address an air bag deployment issue, and I have a free oil change still owed to me. Once I have the truck back to fully operational, I’ll schedule those and take it in.

I pulled into the driveway a couple days ago, and my neighbor ran over to inform me that my reverse lights are constantly on. Sure enough, they were. The first thing I decided to check were the 7-pin connectors under the truck, that supply power to the 7-pin connector in the bed as well as the headache rack. I found that they were all somehow full of water. Looks like once I get everything fixed, I’ll have to do some additional work to waterproof them. But after a bit of diagnosis, I’m fairly certain that the issue is the fuse box itself. There is continuity between some of the trailer fuses where there shouldn’t be. I pulled off all the connectors and separated the wires at the back of the truck, so I know that those aren’t the issue. So that, really, just leaves the fuse box or maybe a BCM issue. I decided I’ll take it into the dealer and let them deal with it. Hopefully under warranty, but we’ll see since they can probably blame it on me somehow.

I also need to take it in for a recall (airbags) and will probably take advantage of one of the free oil changes they included with purchase while in there.

We caused major dents in each of our vehicles over the last week, so I bought a cheap ($50) paintless dent repair kit off Amazon. It consists of a bar/puller, a bunch of glue-on pads, a large hot glue gun, some glue sticks, spatulas, and a little bottle that you fill with rubbing alcohol. This was my first time using one of these kits.

The first dent can be seen in this photo. It was from a runaway rolling spare tire that Kelly tried to pick and move, but let go of. It rolled into the rear passenger door of her Frontier:

This took two pulls with the pad to get out, but you can’t really see it at all anymore.

She also had a door ding on the other side that I pulled out with similar results.

On my truck, I crushed in part of the cab with the trailer while seeing how sharp I could turn a few days ago. I didn’t take any before photos, but it was substantially caved in. It doesn’t look perfect, but after about five pulls I was able to get it almost back to normal. With more work it could be even better, but I was working on this in full sun on a 90° afternoon, and decided enough was enough.

Overall I’d say that the kit does a very good job and I’m satisfied with the results. I’ll probably go back and work on my truck some more but believe me when I say it is an substantial improvement. On another note, you can see in the photos that I bought a new CB antenna and a “matching” scanner antenna, to put on the opposite side. I think they will look a lot better than the Firestiks, even if they’re a foot shorter and do take away from range. I was able to achieve a perfect SWR with the new CB antenna.

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