Cummins ISC Diesel Engine CAPS Failure

Cummins CAPS Assembly Repair from John Whelan on Vimeo.

This Cummins ISC diesel engine is in a 1999 Thomas pusher school bus. The engine died suddenly and eventually we found the drive failed in the CAPS pump assembly. Luckily the fuel injection shop we deal with had a core in the back room. We got lucky because the replacement of the pump assembly is around 4,000 dollars.

Most of the ISC diesel engines in our fleet have required a new pump. What happens is multiple engine codes that don't go away. There's a lot going on in the CAPS assy. It develops and controls the high pressure fuel that is distributed at the right time to each injector.

Running at 250 horsepower they are a great engine well suited for a school bus fleet. Other failures were injectors but not very often. The crank and cam sensors act up along with fuel leaks at the electric fuel pump. Our fleet only has 3 of these buses left and they are standing up very well for being thirteen years old.

The fuel pressure sensor in the CAPS accumulator was a regular failure through the years. Cummins did come up with a update on the sensor along with a replacement harness. It only takes 10 minutes to replace the sensor. I personally think Cummins has always been the leader in medium duty diesel engines.

I was an International DT466 fan for years until the emission and electronic version came around. Mechanical fuel injection can not keep up to emission guidelines and the old DT had to be scrapped. They were the best fleet diesel back in it's day but sometimes good things have to come to an end.

At present Cummins has the ISB which runs on DEF (diesel exhaust fluid) and besides the extra maintenance they are the most reliable engines in our fleet. They run seamlessly with the Allison automatic transmissions and the operators really like them for power and we like them for reliability.
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