Seneca 2018.5 DEF tank error codes

[Rustynuts]

Originally Posted by rpietsch

BTW, I double checked the MFG date in the Drivers door. My coach must be one of the first of the 2018 S2RV chassis.... Manufactured in Sept 2017.

My door sticker also says Sept 2017 but here is the actual build info based on the VIN off the DTNA website.

[repeach]

Not to copy TOO much from Brian and James, here is my version of my Bluefire. For some reason I am still getting a N/A for DPF Exhaust.

And I would love to get a "DEF MPG" and "DEF Trip MPG", But I am not sure that the ECM gives that information.

Thanks for the help guys!!!

[Erat]

I just wanted to sign up to the forum and thank everyone who has taken part in this thread. As well as bump it with a post from mid 2022 to let everyone know people are still having this issue.

I don't even know if i can hit all the details on this saga, but i'll try my best. What an ordeal this has been.

March 2022 we purchased a 2018 34ts. It had less than 10,000 miles and was practically new. We purchased it as a business to haul my hydroplane race boat and team around the country. My dad plans on living in it mostly full time except for a few months during peak race season.

Shortly after purchase we did a few short trips, northern Michigan, Irish hills area, stayed local around the house. All 150 mile or less trips, no issues. Come June, we had a trip down to Guntersville AL with the race boat. Got all rigged up(i think we rolled the scales at 31,000lbs) and headed south. It was about 100F outside. While pulling a few of the hills we got one DEF light, then 2 DEF lights, then 3 DEF lights. It went into derate just south of Nashville. We stopped to diagnose but couldn't get anyone to look at it, FCCC didn't have anyone at the time. Plus i had to be at the race site the next morning. So we limped it down doing about 35mph. The next morning we called FCCC and they sent a tech out.

The tech comes out and finds 6255, 3497, 1713, 4769. He can't fix it. He calls the dealer, they can't fix it. So he clears the codes so we can go home. His suggestion was to take it to a local Freightliner service center and have them fix it. We took all the information, called our local service center and made an appointment. (there was another huge ordeal where the RV dealer didn't put the chassis in our name, that took a few weeks)

We leave Guntersville after the races at about 11pm Sunday night, got to somewhere just north of Nashville and 2 of the 3 DEF lights came back on, it was about 3am at this point. We were tired so we fell asleep in a truck stop. The next morning started it back up and had no CELs the rest of the trip home.

Finally got it to a dealer a week ago and they couldn't fix the issue(under warranty) because the codes were not "active". How did the damn codes get there to begin with? Not because something isn't wrong... Apparently this is Freightliner policy that somehow nobody at FCCC bothered to tell us about. Now the coach is out of warranty (23rd) and a header replacement is $800. I asked them about the swapped around coolant lines and got just about the dumbest answer out of the Freightliner dealer. It was along the lines of "i've never seen that before, so i doubt that's a thing", except a lot more condescending. Nothing was fixed, inactive codes were cleared, we were sent on our way with a $200 diagnostic bill.


Thank you to the person who posted the coolant line diagrams. That's my next task, going to try and track those back and make sure they're not crossed. If they are, fix them and hopefully the damage isn't done so we can make all our trips the remainder of the season. We've got a race in Ohio this weekend, Kentucky in a few weeks, San Diego in September, and Lakeland FL October.


Anyway, the Jayco is nice. We looked for about 4 years to find the right coach and the Seneca ticks all the boxes for us. We've had a few other minor issues, but nothing that is show stopping. Sorry for the long winded post. Hopefully it made for some good bathroom reading material.

[miles ahead]

When I had my DEF problems a couple of years ago on my 2018 S2RV with just short of 10,000 miles on it the first Freightliner dealer replaced the header without knowing about reversed lines. So by the time I got home (another 150 miles) I had the same problem. This time I called FCCC before I took it to the Freightliner service and then had to have the service center call FCCC because they didn't believe me when I told them about reversed lines. They then had to replace the header again and the heater.

[Erat]

Took me all of 3 minutes to figure out the lines were crossed. Got that fixed. Other than making a bit of a mess with the coolant, it was an extremely simple fix. Again, thank you to all who have participated in this thread.

Called FCCC just for kicks, turns out there IS a bulletin for crossed coolant lines. Further proving my point that the people at Wolverine Freightliner are certifiably braindead.

I just hope that the damage is not already done. I hope that by changing around these coolant lines all these problems will go away. I have my doubts, but one can hope.

I also found this roached connector (maybe it is a looped connector) laying on the DEF filter unit. Anyone see this before? Know what it might go to? Regardless it probably shouldn't be the way that it is.

[Gunfighter]

Just a brief comment by the guy who started this thread back in July of 2020. I went through several DEF coolant line valves before FCCC told me to have Freightliner check to see if the lines were reversed. Before this went through a DEF Header and a second when they figured it out. If you put on over 10K with the lines reversed I will bet you end up replacing your DEF header. My mileage was mostly through the desert with high temperatures which I think contributed to the DEF header failures. DEF coolant line valves before FCCC told me to have Freightliner check to see if the lines were reversed. Before this went through a DEF Header and a second when they figured it out. If you put on over 10K with the lines reversed I will bet you end up replacing your DEF header. My mileage was mostly through the desert with high temperatures which I think contributed to the DEF header failures.

[Rustynuts]

Originally Posted by Erat

Took me all of 3 minutes to figure out the lines were crossed. Got that fixed. Other than making a bit of a mess with the coolant, it was an extremely simple fix. Again, thank you to all who have participated in this thread.

Called FCCC just for kicks, turns out there IS a bulletin for crossed coolant lines. Further proving my point that the people at Wolverine Freightliner are certifiably braindead.

I just hope that the damage is not already done. I hope that by changing around these coolant lines all these problems will go away. I have my doubts, but one can hope.

I also found this roached connector (maybe it is a looped connector) laying on the DEF filter unit. Anyone see this before? Know what it might go to? Regardless it probably shouldn't be the way that it is.

Here is what I dug up when I was discussing this issue with FCCC who at the time said it was only a very small percentage of chassis this was happening to.

[ralett]

We have a 2018.5 37FS, bought in Jan 2018; Frieghtliner tag says the chassis was built in July 2017; Jayco tag has a build date of October 2017; Engine build date is June 2017. The unit has 15K miles on it.

We had the def header replaced in June 2020 at Freightliner of Bakersfield, CA with about 7500 miles on the rig (see earlier post). At that point, I was unaware of the backward coolant hose issue.

We've used the rig regularly since then with no repeat DEF issues but these have been mostly short trips (125 miles or less each way).

We had a longer trip 3 weeks ago. We live in So Cal and were driving from northwest of LA to Arizona. About 200 miles into the trip, in the desert between Barstow and Needles, CA, we got a Malfunction light and then the def level starting flashing one red LED. I had filled the def take before the trip so I knew it was still nearly full.

Unlike the first time this happened, I did not get the "Shutdown in progress" message. I kept driving, got to our detsination and parked it for a week.

Fired it up to leave, and everything appreared fine for about 20 miles, then the malfunction light came on again and the def gauge started flashing 1 red LED again. I drove it home, a little over 300 miles, and by the time I got home I also had a Check Engine light on and a Yellow LED on next to the word "DEF" above the Def Level gauge.

I then ordered a Bluefire adapter, downloaded the software, and took another short trip. The rig had been sitting for a week but I had the Malfunction light on, Check Engine light on, and 1 red LED flashing on the Def guage upon start up.

I am getting multiple codes: 1761-11, 1761-9, 3031-9, 3364-11 and 3364-9

I am also heating my def fluid. I drove 75 miles today mostly along the ocean so outide temps in the high 70's to low 80's. The def temp was 70 degrees when I started driving and started rising almost immediately. It eventually got to 165 degrees, then jumped to 417 degrees on the Bluefire app! Now, the coolant temp never got above 220 so I am suspecting a sensor failure issue caused that erroneous 417 def temp reading. Interestingly, at that point the yellow LED on the Def gauge on the dash came back on (it had been off for this trip).

Pretty obvious that the coolant lines on this rig are backwards. The def header is probably shot again. Not sure about the control valve or any other damage.

I also have the Bluefire app showing my Def concentration at 63% even though I put 6 gals of new def in prior to the AZ trip. Not sure what that is about.

I'll be calling Freightliner in the morning. I will be expecting them to cover this repair.