Built on Real
Experience.
Elite Diesel wasn't built on a business plan. It was built on a deep history with Caterpillar, a pickup truck in Wyoming, and a refusal to do anything halfway. Family-owned. Veteran-owned. Running since 1996.
Troy Lake
Troy Lake is a certified Master Mechanic with a long history at Caterpillar: time inside the company and years alongside their engineering teams on real applications. He started Elite Diesel in Dubois, Wyoming, running mobile service out of a pickup for the ranchers, loggers, and truckers of the mountain west who needed the work done right.
He's built engines for work trucks and race trucks alike. He's diagnosed problems that stumped every other shop in a 300-mile radius. He doesn't guess. He knows.
His son TJ works alongside him at the Cheyenne shop. Two generations. Same standard.
- Founded
- 1996
- Headquarters
- Cheyenne, Wyoming
- Owner
- Troy Lake
- Certification
- Master Mechanic
- Prior Experience
- Deep CAT background: factory & engineering teams
- Ownership
- Family-Owned · Veteran-Owned
- Platforms Serviced
- CAT · Cummins · Detroit · PACCAR · Volvo
Two Full Pardons.
The Shop Is Whole Again.
Troy was prosecuted under the Clean Air Act for conspiracy to disable emissions controls on hundreds of commercial trucks. The work was done for customers who asked for it, in an industry caught between regulators and the reality of keeping a truck on the road. He served seven months.
On November 7, 2025, President Trump granted Troy a full and unconditional pardon. On February 12, 2026, the president pardoned Elite Diesel Service itself. A rare second pardon for the company. Civil rights fully restored.
Today Troy is a leading public voice for the Diesel Truck Liberation Act, H.R. 8079, introduced March 25, 2026 by Rep. Mike Collins (R-GA-10) with a Senate companion from Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-WY). The bill would bar the EPA from enforcing Clean Air Act emissions-control requirements on motor vehicles.
How We Got Here
Knowledge. Quality. Innovation.
These aren't words on a sign. They're how the shop runs. We don't guess at diagnoses. We don't cut corners on rebuilds. And we never stop looking for a better way to do the work.
That's why we build our own injectors. That's why a chassis/engine dyno is coming soon — so we verify instead of just taking the customer's word. That's why people who could go to a shop down the street drive 800 miles to bring their truck to us.