dieseldoc

The "bottle test": we took a radiator cap and took the guts out of it and installed a fitting in it. Hooked a hose to it and got a clear 1 gallon jug(washer fluid bottle works well). Put the hose from the modified radiator cap into the jug. Once the engine is at operating temp the bubbles should slow significantly and be intermittent. If the bubbles are steady than it is highly probable you have a head gasket(typically cylinder head, but could be air compressor) or cylinder head issue, or pre-cooler in the case of ACERT engines. It is best to do this test under load, we had a chassis dyno at my dealer. However you can do it while driving the truck and having somebody watch the bottle. Not scientific by any means but was quite effective and about 90% correct. With your truck not pushing coolant I am leaning more toward a poor flush job from a previous failure.

Does the truck have an APU(auxiliary power unit), tied into the engine cooling system that could be contaminating it or putting soot in the coolant?I would think that for their to be a current problem putting combustion/soot in the cooling system, it would need to be also putting pressure in the cooling system as well. It is quite possible that it is contaminated coolant from a previous failure. . . . or a cooling system not cleaned well enough from previous issue. I guess I personally have not seen this happen in CAT powered vehicles. I personally would check for excessive pressure building in the cooling system(bottle test) and if that seems ok, I would flush the cooling system and keep a close eye on it for a while. Perhaps take a coolant sample and see what the lab has to say. Sorry I dont have a better answer for you, but have not run across this before in a cat. Keep me posted though I am very curious as to what you find.

I have not seen the coolant turn black before from a head gasket, but anything is possible. However if the gasket is blown and it made its way to a water grommet I could see this happening. C15 heads dont typically crack, but it happens. If you dont see anything obvious I would definitely have it pressure tested. Is it pushing coolant out the overflow? Is it smoking white at start up or while running? Any other symptoms, or just noticed the black coolant one day? If the head gasket is blown I would highly suggest removing the liners and checking the counterbores for wear and the liner flange thickness. It was required for us to do this on jobs that were warranty.

Sounds to me like you have a very similar issue to mine. I would start by checking for low oil pressure and flow. It sure seems to me as though you have either a oil pump or pick up tube problem. I started by checking for pressure at the block by the oil filter near the bellhousing, I had no pressure. I overfilled the engine 2 gallons and lifted the back end up, still no pressure. Pulled the oil filter and cranked several times for 30 seconds and not a drop of oil. Pulled the oil pump out and found it damaged. Doesnt take much damage to the pump gears themselves or the housing. Replaced the pump and housing and it is running strong with good oil pressure now. Make sure you look over the new pump and clean up the sharp edges before installing it.

Well got 3 days and 150 miles on the truck with no issues so far. Thanks for all the help with this thing guys. One more week of test driving without issue and I am sending it home, hopefully to not see it for a long time. Thanks again.

Well I got the new pump and housing yesterday. Inspected it very closesly and it took me 45 minutes with a file and emery cloth to get the big metal machining slag, and rediculously sharp jagged edges cleaned up. If the original "new" oil pump looked like this one it is no wonder it shelled the pump and housing out. I drained the old filter and cut it open, thank god no metal on the clean side of the filter. Put the new pump on and built oil pressure, fired up and ran nice. Mechanical gauge showed 50 psi. Took it out and beat the hell out of it for 30 miles to bleed the air out of high pressure oil system. now time for a cold soak and see how it does. . . . .

- F-650 with an ISB, blown egr cooler which filled the exhaust and intake with coolant. Have to pull turbo to get egr valve off to clean and all the bolt heads are rounded off. - Just finished an F-650 with an ISB, needed a set of injectors, rocker housing gasket, air compressor, and oil pan gasket. - Transit bus with ISL, makes a popping noise. Found intake valve stuck solid and two bent push rods. only took 4 hours to get the valve cover off. - as well as my brothers F-350 "the nightmare truck from hell" also known as the albino turd at our farm. Man roughnecks are hard on stuff.

Thanks Bruce, I will try that. Is it the older engines(94,95) or later engines(96,97) that have the valve. I'm not 100% but Im pretty sure my cover did not have the valve in the back of the cover, but will definitely check with air. Before I pull the oil pump off I did pull the oil filter and crank it twice for 30 seconds with no oil coming out. I am thinking there was something wrong with that other pump. I plan to keep working backwards as I go, put new pump in and leave the filter off to be sure I have oil there first. Than check the oil reservoir, etc. from there. Hopefully was just a pump issue and will finally get this damn thing on the road for more than 20 miles without an issue. Been a pain but have learned quite a bit from it.

I will check the esn Saturday when I get back to it. Ford had to order an oil pump for me, didnt stock anything but the gasket. I am pretty sure my front cover did not have one of those de-aeration valves in it. I will put the pump back on I guess and see what happens. I dont want to pull the motor unnecessarily but dont want to damage another oil pump or worse the engine either. I am hoping there was debris in the oil pump from the manufacturer on assembly( am pissed I did not take the pump apart and inspect first). Are the cracked pick tubes typically very obvious or not so much? am wondering if i put my borescope in the drain plug hole if I would be able to see something or not. Will let you know what I find out.

I dont think the pickup tube is the issue because I overfilled the crankcase 2 gallons and picked the truck up in the back about 2 feet and it did not help, anything is possible though. The air bleed in the front cover I am not aware of??? I know about the check ball in the block for the hpop reservoir. How can I check the air bleed to see if it has an issue? The service manual does not mention anything about a valve in the front cover. Do you think my oil pump damage is the cause of the no oil pressure or a result of something else? Thanks for the info Bruce

Installed manual gauge and no oil pressure. I overfilled the engine and lifted the back end as high as my jack would lift it, still no oil pressure. Pulled the oil pump off and the front cover lookd great an the oil pump parts facing the front cover looked good. Pulled the gerotor pieces out of the housing and did not find any damage to the teeth of the gerotor parts. Flipped the pieces over and inspected them along with the pump housing and they are chewed to shit. There is what looks like metal transfer on the outer gerotor in three spots. The only thing I can think of is there was debris on that side of the pump or a small flake or piece of metal from the casting came loose and got in there. I cut the oil filter open and did not find any metal in it. Am going to ford in the morning for a new pump. Just wish I could pinpoint for sure the root cause of what happened here. . . . I just cant see it pulling anything up in the pump from the pan and it getitng in that location and doing the damage it did, without coming from the pump itself. I did not take the new pump apart and inspect and clean it or measure it before installing it. I will be looking the new oil pump over very closesly before installing it.

I am going to try the synthetic 5-40 and see how it likes it. I was using the motorcraft oil because I was getting a deal on it, and did not want any questions if I had a warranty repair. However my parts man is retiring and guessing my discount is not going to continue with the other guys. Anyway I was buying bulk from the shop and was a bit of a pain. Was going to switch to delvac because I have run that in all my other trucks and tractors, however finding delvac in 10-30 is almost impossible unless you want to buy a 250 gallon tote. I have been watching and found that the 5-40 mobil oil is available all over the place, so if some was needed along the road would be easy to find. I have been changing oil every 3000 mi instead of the reccomended 5000 mi interval ford says. I forgot they offer a 5-40 synthetic. I will have to read up on it. If the truck likes the oil I will probably just use it year round, would be easier than switching back and forth every season. thnaks guys

I am looking for thoughts on switching to synthetic 5-40 in the winter and back to 15-40 conventional in the summer. You always hear how switching back and forth in types of oils especially synthetic to conventional can lead to oil consumption and leak issues Looking for some opinions on this theory. It has started to get colder here and my 6.0 is starting to run a bit rough in the morning when cold. I usually switch to 10-30 in the winter. However I am running into more situations where I cant always plug the truck in. My thought was to try the 5-40 synthetic to see if it really helps with starting in the cold. The truck has 66,000 mi on it and have run ford 15-40 and 10-30. It typically gets below zero for a month or two here. I also am not a believer in extending oil change intervals with synthetic, just looking fore easier starts at -20 F when I cant plug it in. thnaks for the thoughts guys

Our matco guy was trying to sell these the other week. It had a hefty price tag at about $500 bucks. However if it saves me several hours and a lot of frustration it is perhaps worth the big price. Come to think of it I have several big ticket items in my box that dont get used every day or even week for that matter. Would really like to see one in action and try it out. Definitly looks like a very cool item.

Worked at peterbilt during tech school and worked with the engine guys training. I than went to work at the local cat dealer as a truck engine technician for 4 years and ag equipment service tech for cat for 3 years after that. I now work at Cummins for the last 2 years. I made the change becuase I was tired of working 80- 100 hours a week and spending weeks at a time in the oil patch, I now work 4 10s and love my three day weekends. However my blood is CAT yellow and always will be.

I looked at the cover and did notice a small scratch in the cover where the oil pump is. But it was barely noticeable and less than a half inch long. I so hope that is not the cause of the issue. The weather turned to crap here so wont be getting it into the shop this weekend. How small a scratch will cause an issue? I have never run into a base oil pressure problem on these before, always been high pressue system or fuel system issue. Obviously i dont see the volume of these engines you guys do, the help is always appreciated. thanks again.

Both the pan and reservoir were full. The engine stalled with no oil pressure because the reservoir went dry due to the lack of oil pressure. I am going to drag it back in the shop this weekend and try to figure it out. I will imagine the oil pump will be coming back off. Just hope it isnt a pick-up tube issue and the oil pan has to come off. . . . . My plan was to put a manual gauge in and verify no lube oil pressure, put an extra gallon of oil in and see if it helps if not get the back of the truck as high up as it will go and try again(should rule out a pick up problem). Than pull the filter and inspect the bypass valve in the filter base. Dump the oil and inspect pick up tube with borescope. If nothing found there than I guess fill it with oil and new filter. verify it still has the issue, if so off the oil pump comes for inspection.

Installed new ipr valve yesterday. Test drove yesterday 25 miles, all was good. All pids picture perfect. Shut it off and restarted after hot soak of 30 minutes several times and all was good. Parked it last night and plugged it in. Went out this morning, started and it popped right off but oil pressure gauge never moved. Truck ran for 20 seconds or so and quit. No indications yesterday of any oil pressure issues. Checked oil level and is on the full mark. From what I read there is only two valves in the whole low pressure oil system. Is it possible a stuck filter bypass valve is dumpin all the oil back to the pan and not letting it build oil pressure? From my understanding of the system operation and flow diagram I should still get oil to my high pressure oil pump? Anybody run into this before? New oil pump was installed 50 miles ago as part of a complete overhaul, was a ford pump form the ford overahul kit. Thanks for the help guys, this truck is killing me.

Wondering if anyone is working at the sioux city iowa ford dealer. I spotted a superduty there that I am really interested in, however it is 350 mi from me. Just curious is if anyone is from there and could fill me in a little about it, before I drive four hours one way. Since salesman are obviously looking to sell and not necessarily always objective would be nice to have a second opinion. It is a 2000 F-350 dually crew-cab. thanks for the input

I just picked up a new ipr valve. it is my brothers truck and I finally convinced him that even if the ipr isnt the problem now it will be down the road. Since there was a major engine failure there could be debris caught in there that is causing the problem or may cause a problem in the near future. Now if I only had the time to get back to it. I have only replaced 2 ipr valves in the past but they too had the problem hot. will advise what I find hopefully this long weekend.

The truck runs until it gets to operating temp than will stall out and not restart until it sits for an hour or two. will than start right up and run fine until it gets warm again. I have noticed that shortly before the stall, the battery light will flicker. Not going to say they are related yet. The truck had major engine damage to cylinder 7. Engine was completely overhauled( pistons, heads, oil pump, oil cooler, injectors, heui pump, water pump, turbo). I got this truck because of this issue, and it sat 2 years before the repairs were made. I fully expect this truck to have bugs for a while. I will troubleshoot further and let you guys know what I come up with. The truck was at 2 ford dealers and 2 indy shops for this exact issue before the previous owner gave up and sold it.

so if the voltage is above 12.0 idling it is most likely a pcm problem, or if it is above 12.0 when it is acting up it is likely a driver problem in the pcm? I did notice one other odd thing. . . the batt light will come on at random a few minutes before it stalls. Is the pcm responsible for turning the light on as well? Just thinking out loud that maybe the pcm is at fault and showing multiple symptoms. . . that is if it is in charge of illuminating the batt light

I wish it were that easy, was the first thing I checked used to find that a lot on the 3126 cats. solenoid nut is tight, connector is in good shape and pins are securely in the connector. Could a guy back probe in the connector and get a duty cycle type of reading to verify the signal is getting to the ipr valve?

97' f350 manual trans. Engine was just overhauled, out on test drive and check engine light on for icp lower than desired. I expected this fault since whole engine was apart, died on me a couple times but restarted. Took truck out and pounded on it to bleed air. Parked and shut truck off, cleared all faults and it sat about 20 min. Started truck up to return to shop made it 300 feet and truck stalled, would not restart. Sat 10 min and would fire but die right away. Hooked up scan tool, checked faults and have continuous P0470 for exhaust back pressure.Monitor pids rpm was 170, vref 5.02, vpwr 12.34, ipr command 55% after cranking 20 seconds, icp_v is .38. that indicates to me no icp pressure building. I am leaning towards an ipr valve sticking or having issues. Just curious if I am missing anything or possibly on the right path. Thnaks for the input guys.

Thats what I was thinking. Thanks Bruce.