I just bought PDS and am not going to have a place to plug it in this winter, and was wondering if there is something else I could do to keep from plugging it in.

 

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Welcome to the site indeed!

While it does help in extremely cold climates, most modern diesels don't require that you use the block heater to get started. Unless you live in the far N., I wouldn't worry too much about it.

 

Use a good fuel additive like Power Service or Stanadyne - keeps the fuel from gelling in the really cold weather.

I have an old beater 1 ton Chebbie with the crappy 6.2 and I don't have much of a problem even with that POS in moderately cold weather.

NoMo's right - I wouldn't worry too much about it.

 

One thing I do when its cold, Is wait a little longer after the wait to start light go's off, to start it. Seems to work good on my '97.

 

When its below freezing I let the glow plugs cycle twice on my old 86 6.9 and it starts without a problem.

-Sarge

 

I had a autostarter installed on my SD that will automatically start when it get below what ever I have selected. I believe up here in Alaska I have it set at 0. It will run for 20-30 min and shut off for 2 hrs then do it again. I only set this up when I know it is going to be -20 or below. It seems to start fine down to there

 

Ive had my 01 f-250 unplugged in below zero in VT. It will start, but does the loaping thing for a sec before settling into a regular idle. This winter I will run 10W30 oil instead of 15W40. Supposed to help.

-Shawn

 

The glowplugs on a 99'+ powerstroke run longer than the wait to start light. The glow plugs can remain under power as long as 2 minutes. The actual power etc is controlled by pcm. In severe cold conditions even waiting a few seconds beyond the wait to start light is not a bad idea.

The glowplugs are only part of the cold start system on a powerstroke. Most of the other systems do more after the engine is actually started.