Matt Saunoras

We had a 5.0 head sent to the machine shop and they found excessive exhaust valve guide wear. I forget what the original complaint was. I just remember that there were no guides available from anyone.

Right now in the shop 11 F-250 6.7, retail EGR cooler, reductant heater/sender, trac bar balljoint, hot side cac duct, 14E03 09 F-250 6.4, no torque converter lockup, P0741, P1744, no idea yet. Outside 06 E-450 V10. Aux a/c compressor locked up, crossed it and the shredded belt to napa numbers and those parts are here. Gotta figure out how I'm going to flush this thing and who to call about PAG oil capacity. It's a Carrier system 2006 F-550 6.0 service body. Intermittently dies out, cust doesn't hear the HFCM running when it happens. Needs diag 2012 F-250 6.7 with a 6" lift. Cust had driveshaft u-joints replaced and driveshaft reindexed to try and fix a driveline shudder from take off. I've been in this truck before and something isn't right. Needs pads and 4 rotors machined also. 08 F-550 6.4 rollback. Put a shortblock in this thing last May. See above post. Had to order a new trans jack for pulling these things out on the floor.

Got an 08 F-550 6.4 towed in today. 18' rollback. It's broken 4 flexplates in the last month. They didn't want me to look at it initially because I'm always at least a week out. 1st flex plate broke they installed #2. That one broke so they put a third one and a new converter. Then the 3rd one broke and they had me go down to the garage and look at it. The flexplate adapter where the converter hub sits in was all worn out. Checked crank endplay (.006") dowels are present. So they put in flexplate #4, an adapter plate and a third converter. Now it's here with another broken plate. Going to have to tear this tranny down for sure, they don't seem to know if it is shifting okay or not.

Just 3 valve 5.4s and v10s. I usually get a run of manifolds every year and I kind of feel I'm overdue. We stock 6.4 manifolds and I was notified by parts that we haven't sold any in over a year.

I coated that bare tubing in some PM-13-A last night before I left. Also took a hardened piece of that RTV and I'm soaking it in a sample of diesel fuel to see how it reacts. No change after a few hours this morning. The aftermarket portion of working on these trucks can really suck up time. This area is tough though, these guys don't have any options for service.

Yeah I wondered about that. This was that dark gray RTV that comes in the caulking tube. It is a diesel too if it matters. I would have welded the middle except I'm not comfortable with welding stainless. I service this truck regularly and with the way its rusting out I've got a feeling it may need a tank in the near future. I'll keep a close eye on it

Stainless exhaust tubing and filler neck hose? I sealed the pipe to the rubber with a hefty dose of RTV. We'll see if it holds. The pipe ends almost touch inside the hose. I doubt it can pull apart, but I'm mainly concerned if it leaks or not.

Thanks. My parts guy found a number but wasnt sure if that was included in the kit.

Anyone ever ran across this? An 03 F-550 bucket truck that has a fuel leak. Found the metal elbow rusted through on the fuel filler neck. Does anyone know if this was once a factory part? Finding hose is not an issue, it's the bends that are a problem.

Awesome! I will say, and I left it in the survey, that it irritates me that we as a non-MD dealer can't service and get parts for MD trucks. There are no dealers locally that will even work on these things. Here I am willing to learn and I'm stuck with no options. If all I had to work on were trucks we sold I'd be out of a job.

I have 2 unison rings here that are cracked in the same fashion. I am going to try and TIG them back together when I get a chance. Also I agree, when the turbo is rusted so bad it spreads them apart and cracks them, the turbo is a loss. A cleaning at this point would be extremely temporary.

Had an 06 E-450 V10 bus dropped off last night with a nice long trail of coolant through our parking lot. Guess it threw the belt about 5 miles up the road and they just drove it here. The aux A/C compressor looks new but it's locked up tight. Not real sure how I'm going to address this deal. None of it is Ford and if the compressor failed that fast it's going to need the rear a/c flushed. It was 2.5 gallons low on coolant too and had CHT over temp codes in memory. I'm not sure how I can tell if it warped heads without driving it. I can idle for a little while and it has no signs of using anti-freeze.

Got an 06 F-250 here for 8 injectors. Also working on brakes and rotors on an 11 F-450. That damn 03 F-550 bucket truck is still here too, been here almost 3 weeks, I can't get to it and they won't schedule around it. It's been non stop

On an 05 I'm not sure, but 03-04 swash plate pumps will sometimes gurgle through the oil filter housing when the pump is bad. edit- I forgot I had one no start hot in an 06 F-250 and while checking everything I could think of I removed the high pressure pump and air checked it on the bench through the old STC fitting. I had an IPR installed and powered shut with a 12v battery. There was NO air leakage through the oil inlet port(where oil is supplied from the reservoir). Air leaking here would cause a gurgling in the low pressure side. I have a welded up STC fitting that has an air nipple on it. I used that and a turbo feed gasket to air check through the original STC. With this truck the leak was determined to be the original old style STC.

Alright this beast is done, everything went as well as I could hope given my skill level. I'll chalk it up as a learning experience. Once again my service manager sticks me in a bind and I bail his ass out. I'm not in the mood for modesty. In the second pic you can see how the trac bar needed bent to fit correctly. I managed to press the bushings out and reinstall them without damaging them, they are dimensionally the same as the 05+ trac bar bushing. Bending those ends was one hell of a chore, I can't tell you how much pressure I had on that thing while heating it in the press. It was a lot. Everything clears pretty well though, not perfect but good enough. The front end feels much better drivng down the road. Hopefully it works out for a while.

I called PMF and it seems the reason nothing lines up is the front springs on this truck. The axle is positioned rearward due to the lift which knocks the trac bar way out of alignment, not length wise but front to back. Even though the customer provided an adjustable trac bar it won't work without modification. Basically I found the reason the original bar bracket broke. It wasn't being stressed side to side like it normally would but rather it pulled the bracket off the front of the axle. The only thing I could come up with was to press out the bushings and put opposite bends in both ends of the new trac bar. The bushings will sit in the brackets correctly with the lower bracket positioned back away from the tie rod. I've spent countless time on this damn thing, most of it while laying on the creeper scratching my head.

I did one cab on for almost the same reason, misaligned HPOP connector.

Man this is not going well. I got the new weld in bracket parts in and a slightly longer adjustable trac bar. I have everything mocked up but the damn bracket puts the trac bar too close to the tierod. It'll hit full lock either way. I'm not real sure what to do yet, it's been a long ass day and my brain needs a break.

I noticed that it will go on either way which just added to my confusion. Yesterday wasn't one of those really rare awesome days where everything just clicked.

I can't imagine those parts could work their way through the oil feed line.. There's definitely nothing like that anywhere in the turbo but I would check the VGT solenoid just for the hell of it

We actually stock a 3 bolt starter which is the main reason I installed it, that and not realizing what the differences were. I see now about the gear reduction on the 2 bolt. The 3 bolt gear is driven straight off the starter body, no wonder the 3 bolt starter fails more often, that's a lot of stress put on it. Well whatever, my 7.3L is gone, it's got good cranking rpm now

I guess it doesn't matter, got a new 3 bolt starter, put it in and everything is fine. I think the main problem is my parts guy is a dick

I've got an 02 F-550 7.3L with a ZF-6 here. Amongst all the other crap I'm doing to this thing the cust brought me an oem starter in they got from our parts dept. The issue is the starter I removed is a long 3 bolt and the one the veh calls for is a smaller 2 bolt. I'm not sure which one I should be using and what the differences are. The reason they brought me a starter is the low cranking RPM. Like 90-100 rpm max. Anyone know anything? Perhaps the tranny was changed at one point?

Yes it was ELC coolant which was flushed out at the end of the repair. I can't blame that as the root cause however. The rubber tranny lines on the front of the radiator were leaking so badly that the almost half the rad core was plugged with oil and debris (not to mention the whole front of the engine). This caused the fan clutch wires to get sucked in and chopped to pieces. Can you imagine a 22 passenger bus with no fan clutch in the summer? I bet this thing got a little hot for that EGR cooler to handle. It did melt the turbine also but surprisingly didnt take out the headgaskets or crack a head......yet.

I've got mixed feelings about cab lifts. I really like it once the thing is up in the air but getting there can be a chore sometimes. This 04 I just did headgaskets on was probably the most rusted one I've pulled. Nothing wanted to come loose, tranny lines wouldn't come out of the rad, p/s lines wouldn't come off the box, couldn't chance opening the brake lines at the HCU because there's no way bleeders were coming out afterwards if needed (that whole mess stayed with the chassis). Cab bolts needed more heat than I felt comfortable with and all the fenderwell connectors gave me grief going back together. The guy I work with used to do a lot of 6.0s back in the day. He insists there's only one cab he didn't pull for a headgasket job and the only reason why was he just wanted to try it without. I've worked on quite a few 6.0s and 6.4s that I couldn't pull it even if I wanted to in the worst way. It's best to know the job from both sides and make the repair based on what can and can't be done. I can not say I've ever done an E-series, Excursion or F-150 yet though. Only F-series super duties so far.