i would suggest starting with a lift kit and big tires


welcome to the forum

 

I would reach out to the guy on this forum that offered to look at your truck. He has no financial incentive or bias involved. I bet if you bought him a beer and a steak his advice would be well worth it.

$5000 goes a long ways on these rigs.

 

Seriously? That's his girlfriend (future wife). Of course with the hairstyle it is a little hard to tell...

 

Have you never seen Razzi? I think a few pints and a side of beef is a meal for that man Not saying you're husky Razzi, just that if I were going to get in a fight with you, Twitchy, or Stewart it wouldn't be you (or Stewart)

 

He has a RWD looking to squeeze every drop of oil

OP: Open a door, any door. The in lights should come on. Close the door & walk around to the back. Open the rear glass, The lights should still be on. Close the rear hatch HARD . The lights HOPEFULLY will go out . If not try again. If it is the back hatch (85-90 + %) IMX. There is an easy fix for it.

 

Also Razzi has a lifted 2wd so if you want to see how sweet it can look there is a nice example for you

 

Per our dear friend Apoc: Spring, in the safety and comfort of my driveway

It actually goes VERY far on a 7.3....

If you did fluids, filters, and fuel, from front to back on the truck and included all things Riffraff Diesel, you'd spend close to $2700.

This includes:

-Fuel bowl rebuild/reseal
-New updated UVCH for both sides
-Front and Rear Diff Fluid
-Power steering flush
-Transfer Case fluid
-ELC coolant
-Coolant flush
-New upper and lower radiator hoses
-Synthetic oil
-Hot Shot Secret
-Oil filter
-Fuel Filter
-New glow plugs
-Trans flush per Mark Kovalski's write up
-ESOF soft vacuum lines upgraded
-Riffraff Frx
-Riffraff Hpx
-Riffraff Plenum Inserts
-Riffraff CAC boot kit
-Mechanic's Cabinet O-ring kit
-Jimmi Jammers
-Dieselsite Coolant filter
-Hutch and Harpoon Mod kit
-AIH Delete Plug
-AIH code eliminator
-John Woods Valve body for the trans
-Blank non-ebpv turbo pedestal
-Riffraff Billet Compressor Wheel
-Riffraff High flow CVD fittings
-Riffraff Banjo bolts
-Riffraff/Garrett Turbo rebuild kit

A job like this DOES NOT take an 8 hour day to do. If you worked for 24 hours straight, ok that sounds about right, but work like this takes atleast 2-3 days to properly do provided you aren't interrupted.

That's just parts, a good shop would charge about 14 hours or so for a job of this undertaking at $100/hr+.

When everything is said and done though, it leaves you with (provided the HPOP, Up pipes, and oil cooler seals are still good) a leak free, powerful, very reliable and very scalable truck that will run like a wild, rabid, beast. You'll also have nothing to worry or think about either because everything's been done.

It'd be a good fight between you and Twitch, if Stewart got ahold of you, I'd be terrified. He looks like one of them "wrap up and squeeze till they stop squirming" types.

A few pints and a good steak can grease the wheels some.

 

@Toredor

you sound pretty sharp on repair pricing , maybe you can give us some ideas. not saying this is the OP issue since his sounds more like routine maintenance stuff so this is more of a what if ,

lets say the quote was $5500 and could be done in 1 day.
use 1 day as 12 hours @ $100 and hour.

$1200 in labor leaves $4300 in parts.

what parts cost $4300 and could be repaired in a day ?

all i could come up with off the top of my head was
new semi-wazzo transmission
new injectors-turbo-intercooler

another combo of $4300 in parts that could be done in a day ?

 

6.8 swap? I mean if you just want to spend the money...

 

Spray PB Blaster into all of the door/hatch latches and spray them good. Solved it for me

 

They're probably talking about doing:

-Glow plugs
-Very possibly replacing all 8 injectors (depending on the mileage of the truck, DI recommends replacing the injectors, this is probably where most of it is coming from, ask me how I know)
-New UVCH
-Rebuilding/resealing the fuel bowl
-Probably rebuilding the turbo pedestal (it's only going to leak again down the road)
-Rebuilding the turbo
-Probably the oil gauge level repair (where the dipstick goes into the pan)
-Coolant flush
-Probably do an oil change
-Change the fuel filter
-They may also reseal the oil cooler if it's leaking
-Throwing a tuner of their choosing on the truck.

From my experience, if you worked a solid and legitimate 12 hours, the above is what you could accomplish. This would leave you with a well maintained engine, but I don't think they're doing anything with the transmission or either of the axles, they could, but the above is my best guess.

Also, they have a good margin on whatever products and parts they sell you. I know, because they've done several repairs for me before I was skilled on these trucks and they took me to the cleaners.

One such repair was my fuel bowl....

I cracked the fuel pressure regulator on my fuel bowl by tightening it too much. From what they told me, you couldn't get the fitting by itself and you had to buy the whole fuel bowl. which cost me around $400 (not for new, but for one they had laying around the shop), they then charged me 4-5 hours of time which equated to about $500. I ended up spending just under $1000 TT&L. I remember this quite well, because I was working for Circuit City at the time and gave up most of my check to get my truck out of the shop.

I've removed a fuel bowl on a 7.3 SEVERAL times and with the proper tools and know-how, you can have it out in less than an hour. Even so, the repair they charged me for should have only taken about 20-30 minutes to complete. All they had to do was replace the Fpr on the very accessible side of the fuel bowl without even removing it and I would've been good to go. Which is probably exactly what they did....

I'm not saying don't let DI Performance work on your truck, but what I am saying is definitely get a second opinion as I'm sure you don't want to be taken for a ride and you'd much rather have a truck that just needs to be driven and lightly maintained. Again, I'm not saying they can't do it, but you could be getting more bang for your buck.

 

Good insight, thanks

To the OP, I know if I was going to give a shop $5500 I would get a detailed quote on exactly what I was agreeing to pay for but hopefully this conversation gives some insight on the situation.

I buy vehicles under KBB value and fix the issue and sell them occasionally and I assure you it is a risky proposition, at this point you still stand a chance to come out on top of you don't over pay on the repairs.

The way I see it.
Kbb on your ex is roughly $8k
4000 + 5000 = you lose
If you can manage to correctly fix what ever the issue is for $4000k then at least you are even. ( minus you time of course )

 

Toreador_Diesel- Thank you for the write up of the specification list - I have messaged you for your #.

I have a diesel mechanic that is one of my customers that buys from me on a regular basis that is coming by the warehouse to morrow to discuss this I am going to print this out and present this - I doubt he has the same skill set that you do regarding repairs - no doubt he lacks the passion.

I am going to try the Ammo at cost for life for labor - to try to get these repairs done.Do you recommend the Bully system and or a chip?

Thank you for your time in writing up that list sir.

 

Forget Bullydog. Go with a chip 100%. We have a Texas genius in 7.3L tuning right up the road from you in Bryan/College Station, TX (Gearhead Tuning) who will get you set up with a proper chip (Hydra) and software (Gearhead recipe) at a very good price, great service and he has an EXCELLENT reputation.

 

Oh yeah, look at the build date on your truck. You have an 01, so there is a chance you have the transmission with the mechanical diode (NOT good). You will need to look hard at the tranny after 190k and not knowing the history of the truck anyway (valve body and torque converter). It might be all good, but if you add any power at all you need to replace/upgrade them both (~ $700). There have been many improvements/upgrades made to the 4R100 rebuild kits since your truck was built. These kits address the deficiencies/weak points that have been found over the years, and make the 4R100 a VERY good, much stronger transmission after upgrading/rebuilding.