American diesel fuel may be hurting fuel pumps made by Robert Bosch, LLC, and causing a variety of vehicles from a number of automakers, namely Stellantis and BMW, to lose power, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) reports.
As a result, the regulator’s Office of Defects and Investigations (ODI) announced today that it has upgraded its investigation into the parts in question, launching an engineering analysis and looking into manufacturers who used them. However, it has not yet required any recall campaigns to be launched.
The ODI first opened its investigation into vehicles with the fuel pumps in question in October 2021, following allegations of stalling in 2019-2020 Ram 2500, 3500, 4500, and 5500 heavy-duty trucks equipped with the 6.7-liter Cummins turbodiesel engine.
Read: Daimler Recalling Loads Of Diesel Vehicles, Including 260,000 Sprinter Vans
Since then, both carmakers filed recalls related to the fuel pump, with BMW indicating that an unexpected reaction between U.S. diesel and the pumps’ internal components was leading to increased slip. That in turn led to grinding and wear that could send particles downstream, and gum up the works.
In a document made public Tuesday, the ODI said that the engineering analysis will look into whether the same issue that affected the BMW models is the same for the Ram vehicles, and others.
The investigation is looking into the internal pump components that are related to stalling and loss of power. It will also seek to identify the total vehicle number associated with the issue and will determine whether that poses a safety risk worthy of a recall.
Autonews reports that, in addition to the heavy-duty Ram trucks listed above, the ODI’s probe also covers the 2014-2022 Ram 1500, the 2021-2022 Jeep Gladiator, the 2014-2020 Grand Cherokee, and the 2020-2022 Wrangler. In addition, the 2014-2018 BMW 328D, the 2014-2016 535D, and the 2015-2017 X3 may also be implicated. In total, more than 490,000 could be impacted by this investigation.
