Chevy Duramax That Pulls Past the Limits

Nicolette Weiler Pushes Her Chevy to the Max

To say sled pulling is a male- dominated sport is hardly an understatement, yet that’s not to say that girls can’t compete with boys on the pulling track. Sure, it doesn’t happen all that often, es- pecially at the top professional lev- els like the Lucas Oil Pro Puling League, but Nicolette Weiler is one of the girls that are bucking the trend and dragging the sled as far as her Chevy will take her.

Weiler started attending sled pulls with her dad, John, as a little girl, and when she turned 16, they developed a plan for her to start pulling. She pulled with John’s stock 2008 Duramax truck for a few years in local pulls, and then in 2013, they jumped in with both feet and purchased a rig they’d build into a puller.

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Looking more closely at the engine, you can see the massive intake piping as well as the second CP3 as part of the PPE Dual Fueler kit.

NEW LIFE HD

The 22-year old veterinary technician and her father purchased the 2006 Chevrolet 2500 HD you see here as a ﬂood-damaged truck for a bar- gain price, making it perfect to use as a dedicated pulling truck. With the help of her dad, the crew at the Weiler Body Shop, the team at Danville Performance and some other local businesses in Connersville, IN, Weiler was able to complete the build on the truck in about eight months. They ﬁnished the truck in October of 2013, and Weiler began competitive professional pulling with the ITPA (Indiana Truck Pullers Association) in the 2014 season with great success, earning ITPA Rookie of the Year honors while ﬁnishing second in points in the 2.6 Diesel class.

Sled pulling takes power, and lots of it, so the Weiler’s turned to Mark Broviak and his team of Duramax performance experts at Danville Performance in Danville, IN, to get the most out of their LBZ engine. The engine was disassembled in preparation for a performance rebuild with upgraded components. A stock Duramax crankshaft swings Carrillo rods and custom forged pistons through .040-over cylinder bores yielding a 13:1 compression ratio. The fac- tory block is capped with a pair of CNC ported Wagler Competition Products cylinder heads that are secured with a set of ARP studs to keep the pressure inside the cylinders. The valves are actuated by a SoCal Diesel camshaft.

THE 22-YEAR OLD VETERINARY TECHNICIAN AND HER FATHER PURCHASED THE 2006 CHEVROLET 2500 HD YOU SEE HERE AS A FLOOD- DAMAGED TRUCK FOR A BARGAIN PRICE, MAKING IT PERFECT TO USE AS A DEDICATED PULLING TRUCK.

Through 2015, Weiler ran this Precision Turbo 2.6 competition turbo, but it will soon be replaced by a 3.0 smooth bore turbo to fit the new PPL Limited Pro Stock Diesel Truck rules.

Lifting the hood reveals the full glory of the 1,100+ horse- power Duramax engine built by Danville Performance.

TURBOCHARGING DUTIES

Spent exhaust gases flow out of the heads into a set of HSP Diesel tubular headers and up-pipes that feed a Preci- sion Turbo competition 2.6 turbo in the factory valley location. Then from the Precision turbine outlet, the used gases flow through wrapped piping toward the passenger side of the engine bay and up through a hood stack. The turbo is fed a steady stream of fresh air through a large diameter inlet with an integrated guillo- tine air shut-off valve located below the driver side headlight. After the intake charge is compressed, it’s fed into a cus- tom Danville Performance air-to-water intercooler that the Weiler’s insulated to help prevent heat soak from the engine bay. Then the cooled air is forced into the engine through an HSP Diesel intake manifold.

The Duramax engine inhales through a large bore inlet below the driver side headlight with a guillotine air shot- off that will slam shut and snuff the engine in the event that the truck ever runs away.

BIG FUEL

To provide the healthy Duramax with plenty of fuel, Weiler relies on a FASS 250 pump/ﬁlter system to send fuel from the fuel cell installed in the weight box to a pair of Exergy CP3s using a PPE Dual Fu- eler kit to mount and regulate the second CP3. The high pressure CP3 pumps pair to deliver fuel to a set of 350% over Exergy fuel injectors that spray large volumes of fuel into the cylinders on demand cour- tesy of Broviak’s EFILive tuning. The en- gine is kept cool with the factory radiator, but airﬂow is enhanced by a pair of elec- tric fans replacing the engine driven fan for more ﬂow on demand and to free up some additional horsepower from the en- gine. The combination was tuned and tested on Danville Performance’s engine dyno, delivering peaks of 1,116-horsepower and 1,798 lbs-ft. of torque to get the sled moving down the track.

To help reduce the truck’s overall weight and allow Weiler and her team to hang more weight up front, they gutted the in- terior all the way down to the inner door skins, re- moving regulators and un- necessary sheet metal before installing a single race seat and fabricating a small dash panel to house the Racepak gauge cluster and various activa- tion switches.

TRANSMISSION WORK

The crew at Danville also built the Allison transmission to handle the grunt from the engine and the load of the sled using performance shafts and internals to handle the sled-pulling abuse. A SoCal Diesel billet ﬂexplate links the crankshaft to a Goerend 3100 RPM stall billet torque converter to pass the power along to the upgraded internals of the Allison trans- mission. A DJ Safety transmission blanket is wrapped around the transmission hous- ing to protect Weiler in the event of a cat- astrophic failure. The factory transfer case directs the power to the front and rear axles through upgraded ADM driveshafts.

To get the power to the track reliably, the factory AAM 11.5-inch rear axle was upgraded with Dirty Hooker Diesel spool and billet 300M double-splined axle shafts. The housing is braced for added strength and uses a set of traction bars to prevent the axle housing from rotating under power. Up front, the Danville team installed an Eaton E-locker and RCV Per- formance Ultimate Axle CV assemblies. The steering system was upgraded with Danville Performance tie-rod sleeves and a PPE center link along with Cognito Mo- torsports mount supports. The beefed up drive train allows Weiler to use aggressive tires like the LT315/75R16 Mud Claw Ra- dial M/T tires wrapped around Real Rac- ing Wheels in all six positions on the truck. Danville Performance crew members also built an adjustable pulling hitch for the truck that integrates a pair of sled stop- pers just in case something happens dur- ing a run.

The factory transmission cooler does the job, keeping the Allison transmission cool, but it was reoriented in the core support for better flow, and an electric fan was installed to push more air through the cooler. Since Weiler only drives the truck a few hundred feet at a time, they use a fuel cell in the weight box with a FASS 250 pump/filter system mounted to the rear side of the box to get the fuel to the dual

The passenger side of the engine bay is dominated by the custom Danville Performance air-to-water intercooler that keeps the intake charge cool while Weiler drags the sled down the track. You can also see the fabricated HSP Diesel aluminum coolant overflow tank as well as the exhaust stack that fires up and out through the pas- senger side of the hood.

RACE WEIGHT

After the engine and drivetrain were ready for pulling action, Weiler and her team brought the truck back to the family business, Weiler Body Shop, and pro- ceeded to gut the interior and remove as much unnecessary weight from the truck as possible to allow them to add weight as far forward as the rules would allow. They secured the passenger side and rear windows in the up position leaving the manual regulator for the driver window to allow her to roll down the window as needed for directions from competition officials. They also installed a race seat and harness along with a custom fabri- cated dash to house the Racepak gauge cluster as well as switches to control the fans, locker and other components from the driver seat.

John Weiler designed a weight box that he and his Weiler Body Shop team built from scratch to house the fuel cell, a pair Looking under the truck towards the rear, you can see the Danville Performance fabricated traction bars as well as the ADM driveshaft, and its safety loops and U-joint shields. of Interstate batteries, an ice/water tank and additional weights. The box is mounted to the frame of the truck as far forward as legally possible to help keep weight on the nose of the truck when the sled is bearing down on the rear as Weiler sails down the track.

Looking under the truck towards the rear, you can see the Danville Performance fabricated traction bars as well as the ADM driveshaft, and its safety loops and U-joint shields.

LOOKIN’ GOOD

The last area Weiler addressed was the look of her truck—since the paint was still in good shape, she opted to enhance it with some graphics rather than repaint the entire truck. Working with the crew at Panther Graphics in Indianapolis, IN, she designed the graphics for the truck’s name “All She’s Got to The Max” to go on the front of the weight box as well as a cool tear-away style graphic for the hood revealing the engine under the hood. The Weiler Body Shop team also removed the badges and moldings on the cab and re- placed them with decal representations.

Danville Performance beefed up the factory rear axle and set up the nearly solid rear suspension. They also fabricated the adjustable pulling hitch and sled stops.

COMPETITIVE SUCCESS

All the time and hard work paid off with her successful 2014 competition sea- son in the ITPA so Weiler decided to take her competition to the next level for 2015 and compete in the Lucas Oil Pro Pulling League (PPL) in the Mid West Region’s 2.6 Diesel Truck class. The highlight of her 2015 season was taking wins in Princeton, IN, followed by Greensburg, IN, on back- to-back weekends in July. She ﬁnished in 9th place for the season points in her rookie PPL season and hopes to do even better in 2016. Her ultimate goal is to take the win at the Scheid Diesel Extravaganza.

Weiler’s whole family supports her, including her grandparents who travel with her and her crew to cheer her on as she does battle on the track. (Unfortunately, her Grandpa Weiler lost his battle with pancreatic cancer just before our press deadline in January, so she will be pulling through the 2016 season with a heavy heart).

With the new rule changes adopted by PPL during the off season, Weiler and her team will have plenty of work to do updat- ing and reworking the truck before the 2016 season starts. But she is determined to run with the boys and beat them at every opportunity. So, be warned, Weiler and her Chevy are out there with some- thing to prove! DW