Well, we took the truck (2002 F250, 7.3) on its maiden voyage towing the trailer yesterday. The camp site is about 55 miles from the house. It's pretty much an easy drive - mostly flat with a couple of very slight grades. So, we're about 1.5 miles from camp going up a small hill and the engine shuts down. No warning - just shuts down. We get the truck and trailer off the road and try to restart it - nothing. I'm thinking "Why didn't I buy a spare CPS?" After about 15 minutes and a couple retries, the thing fires up. Back in business - so I thought. Going up the last little hill, the engine's running like it's slightly out of time and dies again. This time it won't restart. A friend of mine tows the truck up the road so we're off the street and takes the trailer to the camp site. While waiting for the tow truck, I tried to start it again and this time it fires up. So, we've made it to camp.
Does this sound like a CPS issue? Or should I be looking at some thing else? A friend suggested that maybe it started because it had time to cool off. But, the first time it restarted after only 15 minutes - not enough time to really cool down too much. I also have someone that had an extra CPS that we're going to try after breakfast.

 

Sounds like it could be fuel related. You done the in tank mods yet?

 

Fuel, oil, and air are easy places to start. Check your filter minder, your oil level, and you chould have more than 1/4 tank of fuel.

 

Sounds like IPR to me.

 

I agree. Almost identical symptoms to my IPR failure.

 

Would the IPR throw a code on a scanner? We got our daughter coming up tomorrow and I'm going to have her bring a scanner out. We did change the CPS and it seems to run good now. Granted, it wasn't under load or fully warmed up but it didn't sputter going up the hill like it did yesterday.

 

It may throw a p1280 but if the needle is sticking, or oring bleeding when it gets hot then potentially no codes...


I have seen 2 cps's to date that freak out when warm... exactly the same symptoms you are describing... cheap enough to grab one and see... and then you will have a spare if it turns out to be the ipr.

 

Not always. You might get a 1280 code which is ICP sensor. IPR doesn't always throw a code. Mine did not.

 

Took the truck for a 16 mile drive today. Hit some hills, ran the RPM's up to 2500-2600, and it ran fine. So, we're a little more confident tossing the trailer on tomorrow and heading home. I'll report back tomorrow with how the trip goes. Man, the last camping day sucks knowing you have to leave the next day.

 

Oh, and it didn't throw any codes when we hooked up the scanner. We'll do more testing when we get it home.

 

What scanner are you using?

 

We used the only scanner available at the time. It's an Actron CP9125.

Here's the update. (Much nicer replying on a computer rather than the smart phone)

On Tuesday, we took the truck out to town (~8 miles of slightly hilly roads). It seemed to run OK. I took it up to about 2500-2600 RPM on the hills with no problems. So, I was a little more confident with the ride home.

Wednesday: Nervous gut feeling, we hook up the the trailer and get ready to make the trip home. Now, I'm babying it a little because we just want to make sure we make it home with no problems. We make it through the hilly area and on to fairly flat roads. I'm feeling a little more confident. We're on Hwy 12 and go to make a right on 88 and right in the turn, the truck dies. Luckily, there's a big gravel emergency area right there that we were able to pull into. This is about 18-19 miles that we have traveled.

I immediately try to restart it, but it's a no-go. I looked at the tach while trying to restart this time and it sit's at 0. Everything else on the dash is normal - no CEL, no codes. So, now I'm thinking the CPS went out again because of the 0 tach reading while cranking. But, why would it go out so quickly? After about 25 minutes, the engine fires up. The only thing I'm thinking is that maybe it's the additional load (the trailer). So, I call my son-in-law and he stops at the Ford dealer and grabs another CPS and his F350 to haul the trailer home. We changed out the CPS, separate the trailer and decide to make a run of the last 51 miles.

This time I make it 21 miles. Going down the freeway at about 55 MPH the engine dies again. Luckily, I was right there at an off ramp and was able to make it safely off the road. I'm done this time. Time to call the chauffeur...



So, here's some of my thoughts and some things I noticed while driving (before & after it dies).

-- There really isn't any shuttering of the engine before it dies that I feel
-- There was a couple times it seemed like it took a little longer to shift into the OD (could be my imagination)
-- Everything seems to run OK while it's running, although I was babying the engine.
-- With the scanner we have, there's no codes being thrown. There is a misfire reading, though.
-- It'll start up after sitting for 15-30 minutes with no rough idle
-- I doubt the culprit is the CPS now
-- I'm leaning more towards the IPR that rtalich and A/Ox4 mentioned

I read A/Ox4's thread about his IPR issues and it kind of seems to make sense. My mechanic friend seems to think it's the the ICM. I suppose that's possible, too.

* Aside from replacing the IPR, is there a way to test this as faulty?
* Is this a viable replacement part? And has anyone had any luck if they have used it?

 

I'm tempted to say the Actron will not read the codes on your rig. As the 7.3 is a non-OBDII compliant engine setup in our trucks, you need a scanner that reads the manufacturer specific codes. I'd recommend getting the codes pulled using a scanner set up for this. Before I had AE software to do this, I went to a transmission shop nearby that worked on 7.3's, and they had a big snap-on code reader.

 

Thanks, BWST. I'll see if any of our local shops (within 20 miles ) can run a test on this at a reasonable price. I checked out the AE scanner and i will probably need the $360 price of it to use on getting this running correctly. But, it does look like a nice piece and it seems like a lot of PSD owners use them. Probably, later on.

 

Read this thread on IPR. Does not sound like what you have. You should have a code stored. OBDIIs do not read these trucks.
https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/7...placement.html