I thought I would have one, maybe two posts about our engine repair in Albuquerque at Rocky Mountain Cummins. Well, this is the sixth installment. If you’ve been following along, you know I’ve had a number of poor communication issues with Rocky Mountain Cummins and also trouble obtaining a replacement turbocharger. After taking the old turbo to Central Motive Power for a rebuild, I saw light at the end of the tunnel.

When I dropped the old turbo off at Central Motive Wednesday, I agreed to pay for expedited shipping to have the necessary part there by Thursday morning. I called at 11am Thursday to confirm and Aaron told me they had the part and Joe was working on the turbo. At 1:30pm, Joe called me and said I was all set.

I went to their shop straight away and Joe had the turbo waiting on the counter wrapped in a heavy plastic bag.

Rebuilt turbo

He told me the Center Housing Rotating Assembly (CHRA) he acquired was a genuine Holset replacement cartridge. I’m not sure how that works – I don’t know how Central Motive Power has access to these parts. Cummins-Holset (now called Cummins Turbo Technologies) won’t sell component parts for their turbochargers in the USA, only complete replacement parts. They remanufacture turbochargers with new CHRAs at their factory and charge high prices for them.

I’m guessing there’s a gray market that imports the component parts from other, less regulated countries. This drives the price of parts up – for example, a CHRA for a Garrett turbo can be had for $400 or less. The Holset part cost me $750. At any rate, the workmanship from Central Motive looks fine and I’m confident this turbo is equal to a Cummins remanufactured part – that Cummins wanted $1,574.00 plus tax for – if they could supply it. I’m into the rebuilt turbo $1,182 including tax and shipping.

As I was leaving Central Motive, my phone rang. It was Rocky Mountain Cummins wanting to know when I would have the turbo back to them. Yeah, that’s right – they had no problem phoning me when they wanted to know when I would get something done after two weeks of silence when I wanted to know when they would get the job done. I told them I was on my way and dropped off the turbo 15 minutes later.

My timing was good – I dropped off the turbo just as they were ready to install it and I beat a thunderstorm back to Hazel’s place where we spent the night in her guest house. Rocky Mountain Cummins said they would have the coach done mid-day today.

Last night we took an Uber ride up to Rio Rancho to a pre-balloon fiesta dinner party at Brad and Jessica Rice’s house. It was fun to get together with the crew. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to help with the pre-fiesta exhibition launch this morning, but if all goes well I’ll be crewing for the official start tomorrow.

The best birthday present I could wish for is the return of our home on wheels today so we can get set up at the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta Park for nine days of hot air ballooning!