Hi. This is my first post here, but I will likely be posting and reading a lot here in the future. Hopefully my silly thread title doesn't put people off from reading it. I will try to be brief, but I will start with the minimum history i think we need at this point.

1. Just bought a 1992 ford e350 ambulance with the non turbo diesel.

2. Bought it from eBay directly from the ems company that was decommissioning it.

3. I live in Canada but I bought it from Texas and drove it back up here. I searched only the southern states which don't get snow because I figured I would have less rust to deal with than say an ambulance from Seattle.

4. The ambulance had 165,000 miles on it when I bought it. According to the ems rep, both the engine and transmission were rebuilt at 150,000 miles.

5. Ambulance had not been out of service for a year before I bought it. (not sure if this is relevant).

6. About halfway home I noticed a mostly empty can of ETHER in the door pocket of the ambulance. Too late at that point to do anything about such a red flag, so drive on we did.

7. Six hours from home, fuel filter light came on, and fifteen min later we were loosing power. There is a story here regarding why I made the decision to just keep driving, but it can wait. Long story really short: we limped back home at about 1/2 of highway speed as that was the best we could do. The engine had just enough power to keep us in 4th gear so long as the highway was dead level flat. Six hours turned into about eleven.

8. THE PROBLEM: we are actually unseasonably warm here at the moment, but even with being plugged in all night, the ambulance won't start, even at a mild -5C. So being stupid, I used the can of ether. Well, I got it started. But I can only start it with ether, unless it is totally warmed up and only shut off for a half hour at a time.

9. So, how screwed am I? I take responsibility here, but it does annoy me that the folks back in Texas were obviously using ether. Until now, I had absolutely no idea that ether and glow plugs were a bad mix. Grew up on a farm and we used ether all the time on our tractors. Not being a farmer myself, I didn't know the difference. so seeing a can of ether in the door, I figured that whoever put it there knew what they were doing... The REALLY aggravating part is that that can of ether was practically empty when I got it!

10. Can ether wreck the glow plugs themselves? Right from the very very beginning, when starting the vehicle, the WAIT TO START light would come on and then go off after less than a second. The time never changed, whether it was hot or cold. Now I am wondering if the brief flash is a sign of destroyed glow plugs? Is there any chance that whatever damage the ether did to the engine is limited to the glow plugs themselves? Is there a faint hope that the rest of the engine is still sound?


Any thoughts or ideas would be appreciated!

Please no "you sir are an idiot" comments. Believe me, it's a waste of time. No one could possibly give me a tongue lashing like the one I gave myself.

All the best,
Jeff mk

 

The brief lighting of the WTS and then going out means you have some dead glow plugs. Went through this with mine recently and have learned the Ford system measures resistance. With dead glow plugs the resistance is higher and it shuts off the current because it thinks they are hot. I would just replace all of the glow plugs with new, but you can check them with an ohm-meter. Advice stated many times here and form my experience also, use only Motorcraft glow plugs. Other brands will swell the tip and get stuck in the head, and fail with little use.

The reason you may have had the slow speeds is because your southern "non-winter" fuel could have been gelling up. Some Diesel 911 in the tank should help until you fill with winter blend fuel.

 

Start with new motorcraft only glow plugs, the WTS light on a second tells me they are bad, be careful removing them, if they used any other brand they could be swelled. The ether didnt hurt the glow plugs , it is just how they started it when they went bad.

Part number ZD9 is what you want,, no and I mean NO other brand.
Ryder fleet services used to have a good price. Looks like they still do.
Ryder

 

Start with new motorcraft only glow plugs, the WTS light on a second tells me they are bad, be careful removing them, if they used any other brand they could be swelled. The ether didnt hurt the glow plugs , it is just how they started it when they went bad.

Part number ZD9 is what you want,, no and I mean NO other brand.
Ryder fleet services used to have a good price. Looks like they still do.
Ryder

 

Thanks for the heads up on the motor craft parts. I will look around to see if I can get them locally. Are you saying that the others are SO inferior that I should order the motorcraft parts and wait, even if other brands are available?

All the best
Jmk

 

Exactly. Should be able to find Motorcraft at one of the auto parts stores in your town. P/N is ZD9 as stated

 

Exactly x2
Don't even glance at the non-ZD9s, you'd be shooting yourself in the foot.
RockAuto.com if you can't find them locally. 9$ each.

Edit:
I'm in Canada too, RockAuto is still the cheapest if you have to order, even considering shipping and border fees.

 

the reason to wait for the motorcraft plugs is because other plugs will swell and get stuck in the head ,causing you to run the risk of having to pull the heads off to get them out if they break off

 

link number 1 in my signature is the GP's from oreilly or kragen for the northerners i guess haha they are the motorcraft ZD9's

link number 2 is antifreeze it would probably be a good idea to flush and refill so you know the proper SCA additive is in there to prevent cavitation i prefer John Deere Cool Gard II which is what is in my link if you have a john deere dealer nearby i would suggest it. there additive and test strips are cheap.

link number 3 is the fuel filter for the one piece replacement you will no longer have to use the metal bowl that is on the bottom that is prone to leaks

 

YouTube - Why you don't use ether and 6.9 tear down p4

 

X3 on ZD9's!! Read around on this site about all the horror stories caused by Autolite and other branded-plugs...

BlueOvalBud- Great find on the youtube video! I've never seen the pre-chambers before like that, now my mental picture of the engine is much-updated.

However, the title of the video is seriously misleading... it should be "Why not to use ether and GLOW PLUGS on 6.9idi, etc..." (Not that you titled it, I'm sure)

There is nothing wrong with starting a truck on ether when the glowplug system is disabled. That's one of the reasons I did the manual glow plug mod, incase I get in a bind and need the ether, it's a lot easier than using a wrench in the most likely cold and dark conditions on the side of the road, haha.

Oh and I know his glow plug system is engaged, but thankfully his plugs only cycle for less than one second so they don't even hit room temperature.

 

 

I am pretty sure those precups were loose for a long time, I have seen 6.2 gms do the same thing and ether was never used. Used head maybe and the cups were at the wrong depth.

 

BlueOvalBud, glad to here that you have had no problems as of yet. But my question is this... what happens when your factorty controll goes and the plugs stay on till faluire does occur? The tips will likely swell and you will be in the same boat as so many others. For price difference in the gps I will go with piece of mind and only run the motorcraft/beru plugs even tho I have mine hooked up to a manual switch. Even that switch can stick and cause plug faluire.

 

Thanks everyone for the help so far.

Ok, I've gone and done a bad thing. I couldn't find motor craft plugs locally, so I ended up buying Bosch brand at twenty bucks a piece. The guy at the parts desk seemed to know his stuff about diesels and parts etc... When I told him about the motor craft only advice, he said that motor craft was the ford brand and that they were outsourcing anyway... (although this may be true, I don't really know that the desk guy has any more idea about the manufacturing process than anybody else...). They had a bunch of other brands, and I went Bosch, because... Well... I run a small concrete company and Bosch makes a pretty dang good line of hammer drills that have never let me down. Ok, stupid reason... But oh well.

I am now also wishing that I had bought an F350 or an F450 instead! Only half seriousl here, but getting at the engine on this E350 ambulance is insane! Pickup trucks seem to have WAY better hood access. Anyone got any helpful insights or tips here? Or is it just a long painful reach and squirm job?

The main reason I went ambulance, is that I have a hunch that a 92 ambulance would have been maintained a little better than a 1 ton pickup of the same year owned by a construction company... Ems is hopefully more likely to do regular maintenance since lives depend on the vehicle... I have seen employees drive their work trucks very hard... And the boss might not be interested in regular upkeep beyond the very basics....

Anyway, I tried to get at the gps yesterday but my fingers got too cold to work outside, so i am going to have to push it inside before doing much more. It was minus twenty five out... Ouch.

Jmk