Having trouble selling a 2000 F250 7.3L turbo because of the smoke (got an 07, don't need this one anymore)...I originally sold it to a kid I knew (yeah, bad idea) on payments but he didn't pay. I got it back and it was a smoky bitch, eating about a quart of oil every 100 miles. It still starts on the first crank in sub-freezing temperatures (20F lowest so far, and it's a looong crank) and seems to run ok (I've driven a few hundred miles like this) but idles very poorly, often dying when you let off the throttle. The smoke is much worse at idle than when throttled up.

I know he put an IPR valve in it and said it ran much better, and the injectors are over 100k (truck has 425k, mostly well maintained) so I was thinking it might be a problem with them and that he probably put crap oil in it. Maybe a CDR valve as well?

Honestly I've only been playing with Powerstrokes for a couple of years and I haven't been terribly adventurous with them because it's my work truck and I can't afford to break it...but I really don't want to dump several grand into fixing this thing just so I can sell it. Book with the miles is a little over $7k, I was looking for $4.5k, best offer with the smoke was $2k so I figure I need to fix "something". Any suggestions? I was thinking about doing a compression test, changing the oil, air & fuel filter, and maybe the CDR valve and seeing if it helped.

Does this sound like a lost cause? The last compression test was about two years ago and there were two cylinders under 400, but she just doesn't drive like she's eaten a ring. Not strong, but not broken.

 

Welcome to FTE.

If you don't have an oil leak, you are using way too much oil. Is there any oil in the tail pipe?

 

It's definitely coming out the exhaust. I don't recall seeing a 'stream' of condensed oil but there's quite a bit of smoke. There are some minor leaks on the engine, down the valley etc but not enough to even drip on the concrete at my place.

 

If you are getting oil out of the exhaust pipe, you may need to rebuild your turbo. That is the main culprit if oil in the exhaust. May explain using so much oil.

Take the tube off the turbo that goes to the air filter and grab the nut on the wheel of the turbo, see if you can move it in and out. If you can move the wheel in and out, you need to rebuild the turbo. Check the housing to see if the wheel has been hitting it.

Let us know what you find.

 

Eh, I've killed more than one turbo in my life and the oil blowing out the rear doesn't tend to come on fast unless the turbo breaks something. This went from clean to holy crap in about 90 days and she still boosts fine.

I will check for play when I get home though, good point.

 

Seal could go out at anytime. I have seen them run fine tonight and blow all the oil into the intercooler/exhaust tomorrow without a bearing failure. I think injector orings can also cause smoke/oil use as well.

 

A little psychology might give us a clue here. What would a testosterone-ridden uninformed newbie driver do in control of 444 cubes of turbodiesel?

If he didn't have the money for the truck payments, I seriously doubt he had the money for a 4-gallon oil change.

Sorry to bring this up.