What are the symptoms that prompted you to take the rig in for a checkup?

If your motor were truly dusted... you would more than likely have a rough idle shake, grey/dark grey smoke from the tailpipe, and excessive "blowby" (crankcase pressure). Ironically fuel mileage usually gets a little better (due to oil consumption) just before the catastrophic failure.

If you are not exhibiting any of these symptoms... chances are your motor is nowhere near "dusted".

Im betting the "mechanic" took one look at the leading edges of the compressor wheel, saw the normal wear for the roud about 200k mark... and saw dollar signs.

Get your truck the heck out of there.

Compression testing is EASY on these engines.
A test rig can be put together for less than 50$.
Go to harbor freight...
Get their 35$ diesel compression test kit. Also pick up one of their replacement grease hoses.
Attach a double female brass 1/8th npt coupler to one end of the grease hose.
From the compression test kit... take the smallest male threaded quick connect fitting and thread it into the other side of the brass coupler.

Thread the other end of the grease hose into a glow plug port to take compression reading.

Its that easy.

A healthy engine should be at around 400# of compression in all cylinders.

At 350# and lower is where i start planning for rebuild.

If the turbo shaft feels nice and tight... most importantly no fore/aft travel... dont worry about it.
The loss of performance due to worn leading edges on the comp wheel should be negligible.

A picture of the assembled adapter to compression test a 7.3

 

My suggestion is the unscrew oil fill cap with motor running but do not remove the cap. Does the blow by push the cap off of the fill tube?

 

The reason I took it was that I felt what seemed like excessive heat coming from the tranny tunnel area of the cab. Apparently that was normal, but they found the dirty intake and turbo issue while inspecting the rest of the truck.

It seems to run OK, other than being a little sluggish. It doesn't use oil, and I've never seen it smoke. The intake was dirty- kind of a very fine gritty residue with a few dust streaks. I cleaned it and replaced the air filter.

The turbo fan (compressor?) seemed to spin freely with little or no play, but the blades do look a scratched and somewhat rounded.

I appreciate the advice, especially regarding the compression kit. I'll see if I can muster the confidence to try it.

Side note: it does get 18+ mpg...

Thank you

 

.....noone has touched on the reason for the dusting if it's truly there, check your air filter and piping to the turbo, ANY gap or crack or whatever WILL kill that engine in time, any questions about your filtering should be addressed.

 

Will do, I'll look over the intake again.

 

Post a pic of the turbo wheel & intake if you can. That will help more than anything

 

Will do asap. Thanks

 

It's good to see that your guys/and maybe gals are quite
helpful and I got him to the right place. I think I will
stick with this one and learn some things about the 7.3.


Sean

 

Your monster cats are still freakin terrifying Steve...

 

I do have to tell you that the She Devil Keeps the Sales Men away
or at least on there toes.




Bella : aka Big Kitty




Evil Kitty?


Sean

 

Bella almost looks like a bobcat or is that she devil ?

 

Is that a Savannah? Pretty cat, whatever breed it is!

 

BINGO! Savannah F1 high % Her mom's a F1 and Daddy's a Serval.


Sean

 

 

We're still waiting on turbo photos back from Cubanjoe.
So a little chatter is all.

So I do have a question that is 7.3 related and on topic.

For the most part all the basic things that would effect
any diesel engine are very similar between the 7.3 and the 6.0?

The big one being shops that take advantage of owners and
are only looking at the $$ they can take to put into there
own accounts.


Sean