Ok guys I am scared to death of the 6.0 engine. I have a 7.3 and its bulletproof. The ranch I work on has 4 6.0 and they are all in the shop constantly for various stuff. I traded in my pickup Thurs night for an 06 F250 with 175k on the clock and Fri morning after a total of 190mi the oil cooler and/or the egr coolers dumps on it. Needless to say I took it back as I don't have $5k+ to put in it after just buying it. I loved the way it rides and the fuel mileage I got with it but it just reassured everything I have ever thought about this engine. What all do I need to look for on these pickups since I need a CC diesel and these are overly abundant compared to the 7.3? Someone please convince me otherwise before I go to the dark side and buy a Chevy lol.

 

4 6.0's in the stable where you work that are "constantly" in the shop. You bought 1 on Thursday and it crapped the next day. Ok....I'll give this convincing thing a shot . There are many of these trucks that have....gauges so you can tell when there's a problem.....driving them hard before it's fully warmed up......and preventative maintenance is important to keep them....awww heck, enjoy your Chevrolet.

 

Most of our problems are from injectors. I am not in charge of maintaining these pickups and I understand they are alil more sensitive then the 7.3 ( could be our fault never know ) but that pick up I bought was most definitly not my fault. I am pretty good at assessing problems but just like most things new stuff is foreign to me ( I am an ASE Master certified tech on diesel engines ) just need some guidelines on these pickups. Like I said I really like the pickup and if I can get one that would last me long enough to build up the cash again to do the BP diesel swap then I would be okay but I don't need a pickup that in 6mo the oil cooler is gonna crap out.

 

sorry but you bought a used truck with 175k on 175k on anything is gonna cost you money. if you dont like that outlay try a new 6.7... none the less if poeple would maintain there ride they may have better luck

 

To be more serious (first post re-read sounded more "smarty" than I intended- was trying to be funny) the gauges on these trucks are crap. Often by the time you have an indication of a problem you're on the side of the road. There are several options for optional gauges but you need something. The Scan gauge is an inexpensive option and it just plugs in the OBD port so you could check out trucks you are test driving. The fuel injectors do seem to be a bit "fussy" on these engines and they ain't cheap but with proper oil changes and fuel filter replacements and charging system/battery upkeep they seem to do ok. The coolers (oil and EGR) seem to be a problem for a lot of these engines (mid '04 and newer) and would be my first concern if I were shopping for a truck. The spread between the coolant temp and oil temp is the tell for stopped up oil cooler which can quickly take the EGR cooler out with it. If you can get an oasis report for the truck you are looking at it will tell you if the truck has been a pain for the previous owner. The better ones seem to require less maintenance in their earlier years. And lastly, you're at a great place to get info- lots of experience on this website. Check out the Tech folder for more info and if you find something you like jump back on here and ask and someone will be glad to answer any question you might have.

 

If you REALLY want some guidelines then start by reading the tech folder at the beginning of this forum. There is a ton of information about a 6.0. They are REALLY not that hard to work on. For $5K I could have one NASTY hotrod 6.0.........oh wait.........I do. Seriously though. Once you take a little time to figure them out then they're a piece of cake.


One more thing.....The truck you bought was sold because someone knew it had problems. I venture to say that who ever sold it to you knew the same thing and I hope you have some recourse. A factory oil cooler doesn't "just fail" in 190 miles. It was already toast (plugged) and took the EGR cooler with it.

The oil cooler kit and EGR cooler can be had for about $600 (factory oil cooler and BPD EGR cooler). You should be able to replace it in about a day or less.

 

Yea and I did come off as one as well. Not my intentions. I do believe that the guy that traded it in knew about the coolers. I do not believe the dealership knew and they took the pickup back with mutiple apologies. I know buying a pickup with that high of mileage is a gamble but I didnt expect to dump that in it the next day. Otherwise I wouldve kicked on the price alot more LOL. I plan on putting a full set of gauges on the pickup as I did on my current one. They are cheap insurance. I am going to look at an 03 lariat with 118k on it tomorrow and will be taking it to my buddy who is a service manager at the Ford house to get an Oasis report on it. The $6-800 on an egr and oil cooler kit is managable for me. Thanks for the help guys and sorry again if I came off as a smart *** Im still alil steamed about the other pickup deal.

 

If you Buddie at the dealership is willing to spend the time, have him check the oil temp/coolant temp delta. It is the indicator of impending doom (or near future expense) for oil cooler-EGR cooler-head gasket failure. If he can't do it, stop by Auto Zone and get a Scan Gauge II for $159 and get the #'s to put in it for EOTfrom the web (here or their website) before you test drive and you can check the temps yourself. Of course other stuff could be wrong with the truck but if I was buying- with what I know now- I would have to have that info before I would close the deal. Unless the price was so good it didn't matter. Good luck in your search. There are a lot of these trucks out there with good service left in 'em.

 

Sounds good thanks for the info.

 

Well i havent been in the 6.0 scene that long but i will have to say that i bought my 04 6.0 about two months ago with 173,500, installed edge insight cs and the only problem i have had was FICM so far, the truck was a one owner vehicle and seems to be taken very good care of...definately have to do some research on the truck before you buy it but there are good one out there.

 

Well ran the VIN on Oasis and it came back with a reflash in 06 and an injector in 06. Buddy said it seemed like a pretty problem free truck thus far at least as far as Oasis shows. I am gonna try and get it in to him for a delta reading and some other diagnostic stuff on there. I am thinking I can slide into it cheap enough that I could go ahead and put a BPD egr cooler and an oil cooler on it plus do the coolant flush and go to something like the Rotella ELC.

 

I just went through this myself. However, it was my own truck with 122km on it.

I never worked on a diesel in my life before. I had rebuilt a few gas engines but was scared of the 6.0l diesels.

I spent a bunch of time on the net watching videos from BulletProofDiesel.com and other DIY guys. Its amazing what info is on u-tube. But watch what they do don't take what they all say for the truth. I found some of them DIY guys to be full of crap.

From information on this site, u-tube and feed back from all those so helpful here on this site I decided to tackle this myself.

I thought I had a head gasket failure at first, as that would be the gas engine problem, and then I found and did this test from BPD

YouTube - ‪Bad EGR cooler or head gasket‬‏

I really wanted the external oil cooler that BPD sells, but it was too much cash. So, I just bought the BPD EGR cooler and gasket kit from BPD. Get the BPD gasket kit for sure. Everything you need is there. I think if you are going to keep the EGR cooler idea and not go with a delete kit you crazy not to put in the BPD EGR cooler with a life time warranty and serious almost never failure record. Don't waste your money pulling back in an OEM EGR Cooler.

Bought a new oil cooler from Ford. Works well now, my ECT/EOT delta is now 1 to 10 degrees. Seems to be mostly within 3 to 5 degrees delta. But am going to keep watching that now and FOREVER!!!

While apart I replaced my o-rings on the injectors, replaced one injector, took apart by turbo and cleaned it out polishing up everything inside as best as possible.

I bought an Haynes Manual. It was a waste of time as it is written around the 7.3 and little photos or detail on the 6.0l There is a ton of info here. Torque specs, how to's, etc. Just search around. This site really made my re-build possible.

It took me longer to figure out how thing come apart as I have not done one of these before and I did not have a service manual or anything to show me. It took me about 26 hours in total. With another 4 hours or so just screwing around.

If you are use to working on diesels this should be a breeze for you.

I bought the Edge Performance Tuner and have it permanently suction cup mounted to my window and it now displays ECT and EOT and AIT. Plus I can also check for error codes without hooking anything else up. I like that option better than fixed gauges. Plus if there is anything else I want to monitor for a period of time, etc I can just change the EDGE gauges setting to monitor a number of other things. I think for me that is better than permanent gauges that only monitor one thing.

All in all (rough numbers as I do not have the invoices in front of me)
- BPD EGR cooler +/- $350
- BPD gasket kit +/- $129
- Ford oil cooler +/- $450
- o-ring for injectors +/- $25
- new injector +/- $350
- rad fluid +/- $90
- Edge Tuner +/- $500
(I am seeing better pricing now on www.partsguyed.com, will be doing some buying there now)

So all CDN taxes and shipping in I think I am +/- $1600 and am really happy with the job I did. Just takes time. Lots of parts to remove and re-assembly. The wife was ready to divorce me as I was out in the garage every night after work for a week and half of the weekend, but its all good now.

Well worth my time doing the repair. I am certain everything I did would have been $6000 plus at the dealer.

This was originally a project for me to save some money, but thanks to all here, u-tube and BulletProofDiesel it was a seriously needed education for me.

I can honestly say that I never really understood this truck. I never really appreciated the importance of clean fluids, oils, etc. I have run synthetic in this truck ever since its 4th oil change, and that probably saved me from an entire engine loss.You could probably say I kind of neglected this diesel a bit. dad has a 7.3 which is pretty much bullet proof but this 6.0L is a different beast. I now see that.

But an education it was and well needed. So I will recommend doing the job yourself. Ask lots of stupid question, because the only real stupid questions are the ones that didn't get asked and caused you problems later.

I have had frustrating problems with my truck over the last year to the point I was ready to sell it and now I have a new appreciation for my truck and have fall in love with my truck again.

Boy does it run nice!

After all of this, these engines are really no where near as complicated as I originally thought they were. No longer scared to get greasy under this hood!

Just trying to get rid of that last little puff of black smoke on acceleration.

Thanks for every ones help and the well needed education that came with it.

 

Thanks I am thinking of tackling it myself but I talked to one of bpd preferred installer just now and he told me about $800 in labor that's not too bad but I would like to do this myself. Did you need any specialty tools?

 

I have a pretty good arsenal of tools.

I had to go out and buy an set of metric deep sockets as mine is a CDN truck and all bolts and nuts are metric.

I also bought ratcheting metric wrenches. An absolute must for the valve covers doing the injector seals. They were also really helpful on other hard to access bolt around the engine. Plus needed the metric deep sockets and ratcheting wrenches for my dirt bikes. Fought with them on the bikes for a while and figured this job warranted some new tools. So bonus for me.

In your socket set you need a number of lengths of extensions. Most valuable one was the 5" extension on the deep socket to go over the top of the exhaust pipe at the back of the turbo and down to the back turbo bolt to take the turbo off. It was the perfect height to swing the ratchet. made short order of that bolt. Watched guys in videos on u-tube fight with that bolt, swearing, etc. The right extension length and it was out in seconds.

Longer extensions are great to get back to the clamps on the pipes at the back of the turbo.

Had my turbo out in about 20 minutes. Once I actually got down to it through all the stuff above. It was easy.

Oh, I also bought a new smaller torque wrench in inch/lbs. I only had a bigger style torque wrench.

It was a lot simpler than I had expected. It just took along time. Mostly because I have to figure out how it all came apart first.

Funny, I must have spent an hour and a half just trying to get the first glow plug plug off. You won't need to do that if you are not screwing with the injectors. But I could not find any pictures of them to see what they look like. Only picture of the ridiculously expensive Ford tool #303-1114. I tried to build one and it failed. Then back to this site and someone told me the harness was only $40, so I grabbed the vise grips, clamped the wire and yanked it out. Once I had the first one out I knew what I was dealing with and got after it. managed to yank all of tem with the vice grips and not really destroy them. I bared the odd wire, but taped that all back up inside the plastic harness and put it all back together. It was silly little things like that that took me the most time. Once I knew what was below what I was trying to take apart it was much easier. I am sure I could know 10 hours off of that repair if I was to start again tomorrow.

So no really special tools required just lots of time and patience.


Oh a few tips I learned that I will pass on.

1) Clean the EGR valve with brake fluid. Works great. I soaked it in brake fluid and scrubbed it with a small wire brush. Take the o-rings off first so they don't get damaged. Press the valve down with a screw driver and gently wedge it open for cleaning and scrub the underside if the valve and the vale seats to get all the crud off.

2) Clean your EBP tube and sensor while you have the air cleaner out. Will save you from taking it all apart again after to get access.

3) If you are feeling brave clean the turbo inside. It was actually fairly easy. I found this on u-tube. Really helped me see how the turbo comes out and what to expect inside the turbo. Just a bit of a language warning on the video.

YouTube - ‪6.0L diesel vgt (variable geometry turbo) removal!‬‏

These kind of videos really help me see what I was about to take apart or what challenges other may have had.

Hope that helps.