Having a large diesel powered engine doesn’t mean you have to constantly smell the fumes of the big motor, you can easily get rid of those smells, as well as gain some extra horsepower and torque that you may not have ever considered actually being untapped inside of your motor. For a few simple bolt on modifications that are going to help you calm down the smell, and overall sound of a diesel power house, you are going to want to take a look at the air filter, headers, and the exhaust. The headers and exhaust can really be considered one system, but for this article we are going to consider them two different modifications. If they need to be replaced, they will all add up to causing your vehicle to smell more like a diesel power plant instead of a smooth running engine.

Replacing the headers is going to be your first shot at fixing the exhaust leaks, and the main reason why you smell diesel fumes inside the cab of the vehicle. When you are going down the road, the wind is pushing those spent exhaust fumes back towards the cab because of the small leaks around either the heads of the engine, or the exhaust pipe brackets. Either way, replacing them is going to be the first step in fixing the fumes problem.

Next is replacing the worn out exhaust piping system for your diesel powered vehicle. If the system is more than a few years old, you may want to have it checked for any leaks. These will allow spent fumes to rise up into the cab while you are sitting still, giving you the constant smell of diesel fuel. These two mods aren’t expensive to buy the parts, and can be easily replaced in a day by almost anybody.

The last thing you need to check is the air filter. If you have a dirty air filter, then you aren’t allowing the engine to properly mix the air and fuel, and the combustion isn’t happening as hot as it should. Your engine isn’t burning off all of the fuel because you have a bad air filter, and if you change it out, you will be guaranteed to smell less fuel fumes, because the engine is going to be using more of the diesel to put power to the ground, instead of leaking fumes into your cab.

From big bore intake stacks, and manifolds, to super sized six inch bore exhaust pipes, getting diesel power doesn’t get any easier. We want to explain to you how any person with a few simple tools can go out in the garage, or in the front yard, pop open the hood to their diesel powered engine, and begin cranking up the horsepower. Letting an engine breath is a great way to free up some ponies that were restricted at the factory, but you have to make sure that they are emissions legal in your state before you make these modifications. Not being able to pass a smog test means you can’t register your vehicle in some states, but in my personal location in Florida, we don’t have any emissions laws, and people run around with exhausts taken completely off of cars all the time. The reasons manufacturers restrict the diesel engine power is because of these very emissions tests, and because the laws are so strict on new car manufacturers, the producers of these vehicles absolutely have to ensure they meet every states codes. This means putting on restrictions that your state may not require.

If you are wanting to begin freeing up some diesel power that has been cut off back at the factory, then you want to begin by looking at the way your engines intake it set up. If there is a restrictive air box surrounding the air filter, then you are probably going to be able to get a couple of ponies out from under the hood. All you will have to do is purchase an after market air filter that is open, and then remove the air box assembly and save it for a later date, in case you want to sell the truck. This one mod will help the engine breath in a lot easier.

As for breathing out the used exhaust fumes, your diesel powered engine is going to need some bigger exhaust pipes. In most states, there aren’t a lot of requirements on the size of the pipes you can use, but manufacturers still restrict it because of different states emissions laws regarding diesel powered engines. If the pipes are 2 inch or even 3 inch sized pipes, you can probably increase them to 4 inches, or even larger if you are using a fuel map programmer type of unit.

If you are trying to get more diesel power from your large truck or diesel engine, then you have probably already looked around for modifications that you can perform in order to make more diesel power. In order for you to really make the most of your engine, you have to first understand how the systems work together in order to produce horsepower that turns the rear wheels. Torque really turns the real wheels, horsepower keeps them moving, but that is a topic for another day. It is a really simple principal actually, and that is because air and fuel mixed together cause an explosion, containing this explosion inside of a small cylinder helps to spin a shaft, which in turn spins the wheels. All of this happens hundreds of times in the blink of an eye. You can use software to change the settings around, to adjust how much air and fuel the engine is getting at any given amount of time, but for those of you that aren’t that advanced, we have to recommend using an automatic diesel power programmer. These little units are extremely handy for changing around your fuel map settings on the fly. They are so easy to use, even my spouse can use it, and she doesn’t care anything about vehicles.

The first way to build more diesel power is to let the engine breath a bit, and open up its airways. By installing a larger intake, and bigger bore exhaust pipes, sometimes over 4 inches in diameter, you are going to allow the engine to breath in, as well as push out the exhaust fumes a lot easier, and this in turn converts to more horsepower and torque. Once you have modified these two parts of the truck, you are just about done messing with the smaller bolt on stuff, that will give you a quick boost in horses.

The last part that I talked about was the computer programming diesel power unit. These little gadgets let you push a few buttons to change what type of horsepower and torque rations you want, on the fly. If you are towing and need more torque, there is a setting for that. Driving through town, and need better gas mileage, there is a setting for that. It doesn’t matter what your requirements are, having a diesel power programmer will help you adjust the engines fuel map to whatever suits you best at the time.

Getting more diesel power out of your big truck is one of mans favorite goals in life. And with the way that diesel engines are designed, it has never been easier to squeeze more horsepower and torque from that monster diesel engine you are running. There are a couple of mods specifically that will be your biggest bang for the buck when it comes to getting more power from your diesel engine. The first is a computer programmer. Next comes a good exhaust system, and the third comes with throwing on a good breathable air filter.

The reasons that these three mods go together so well, to produce insane amounts of power from diesel motors, is because of the way that motors work on a basic level. On one end of the motor, air goes in, at the other end, the exhausted air and gas is pushed out. In the middle though, there is a glow plug that turns all of this into a very powerful blast, turning that air and fuel mixture into a very powerful combustion, turning over your crankshaft, and producing horsepower and torque. If you get more air coming into the engine, and use the computer to tune the fuel map, along with being able to expel the exhaust fumes more quickly, you are easily going to be increasing the horsepower of your diesel engine.

The computers that I talked about earlier are simply a plug and play matter. You can plug the unit into your ODB-II computer, and adjust a few pre-determined settings on the machine, to change the fuel map in your computer. What this is going to do, is allow you either more torque for towing, and takeoff, a balance for in-town driving, or more horsepower for towing on the open road and highways.  When it comes to diesel engine modification, it doesn’t get simpler than this.

Once you have added the air filter, and the bigger exhaust, the last thing you have to do is put that computer programmer onto the truck. Try a few different settings to determine exactly what works best for each situation you are presented with, and if you encounter any issues with any of the settings, back them off, and start from scratch. Problems that come up from tuning the computer could give you a heads up to problems that your diesel powered truck may be having. If there is anything serious, like stalling involved, you may need to consult your mechanic.  Although diesel engine modification isn’t all that difficult, you should have enough sense to take it in if there are problems you cant fix.