Have you checked the fuel bowl heater fuse? Try disconnecting the fuel bowl heater electrical connection at the base of the fuel bowl.

 

I'll e-mail you two great quick reference guides if you PM me your E-mail address.

 

That weak buzz test isn't good. Before plopping a set of new Alliants in there from RiffRaff Diesel, verify the UVCH is good (link in my signature). As for the oil change... there is no way to know if it was 15W-40 CJ-4, 5W-40 CJ-4, 30W automotive, or molasses. 5W-40 CJ-4 always helps with tired injectors when temps drop - assuming the compression is good.

Winter oil, good fuel pressure, signal reaching the solenoids, and good compression - these are the things to know before spending money on injectors.

I do wonder about the ICP reading, but reaching over 2000 PSI while cranking makes sense.

 

I have not. Isn't it the same fuse for the PCM though? I ask because we eventually got the truck to start with excessive cranking so that means there is power to the PCM.

Pm'd email addy. Thx.




Again, this truck has about 165k. It eventually gets started from excessive cranking. It runs rough and blows some black smoke when revving once started, but it all seems to clear up once hot. That's one clue why methinks injectors or compression.

The driver just did an OIL CHANGE based on his receipts, but that doesn't mean the right stuff was put in there. I completely agree that it is one of the very first things that needs to be checked.

Fuel pressure I really wanna check, but need the fittings. I need to do more research, but if you wanna spoon feed me fitting sizes I won't complain!

Glow plug MODULE (california) is doing it's thing. I have verified output to the glowplug wire and measured glow plug on time at about 45 seconds when it was 80 degrees F ambient. Glow plugs were on even longer when it got colder. (60 degrees 'ish ambient) Socalweather.

UVCH is good as far as my tests have revealed so far. I probably should do a visual. The injectors all click, so there aren't broken wires. I can't recall doing an injector wiring/resistance test, but glow plugs all spec'd out to 0.00 ohms on a cheap multimeter. What do they read for resistance when bad? My electrical knowledge tells me 0.00 ohms is the same damn thing as 0.1 ohms. That small of a variation is negligible in my book unless you can tell me otherwise.

I really wanna do a compression test. I know the airfilter boxes leak dirt and the driver just put a fresh filter on there, so there is no way to tell how bad they let the last one get. It's a commercial vehicle so it most likely gets abused out in the dirt. I have seen some NASTY dirty airfilters on some of the commercial stuff.

The "weak" sounding injectors are a big red flag to me, but I don't have a trained enough ear yet on these engines to say for sure what I am hearing.

Thanks for the help guys. Keep it coming. Please let me know what you think I am missing.

The truck currently has no codes other than KAM. (keep alive memory)

 

I would check your resistance readings again, what your showing is a dead short. Usually they should read any where from .5 - 2 ohms. If the meter shows infinite ohm or your meter displays OL they have opened up, which I believe is the common way for these to fail.

If you do end up with bad injectors i would go ahead and plan to spend the extra $100 to change out the GP's while your in there (you need to remove them to evacuate your cylinders anyway) only use OEM (Motorcraft) glow plugs, the after market variants have been know to swell at the tip which will require a hell of a lot more (unnecessary) work to remove them in the future.

 

It's injectors...

 

I don't disagree - just trying to be thorough before suggesting to fire off the ol' Buck$Zooka.

Here is a good buzz test for comparison. Sorry it's not in 3D, but it is in stereo:

 

I understand your logic, but one could also argue that 1.0 ohm of resistance is a short to ground too! All 8 glow plugs had a 0.0 Ohms to ground. I find it hard to believe all 8 are bad and that 0.0 would be the reading for a bad one. Yeah, high resistance or open would be a whole 'nother story. I have many years of experience diagnosing vehicles and have passed all the ASE Master Technician tests.

Just looking for engine specific help from ya'll and I can't thank you enough for help provided so far. Especially that last video link Tugly. Your injectors all sound MUCH MUCH louder than they do on this truck.

"It's injectors" I am 99% confident that is is too. I just put 8 of them in a 6.0L and a HPOP in the same truck and the bill was close to $4k in the end. That is why I am being careful as I can be before suggesting they get sold to customer.

"Just trying to be thorough before suggesting to fire off the ol' Buck$Zooka."

Again, me too!!!! I would be really upset, and so would the new customer if they spent 3k on injectors just to find out it was something else.

 

Revolv,

I sent you two e-mails. One with the quick refernce guide that some of the very knowledgeable folks here on FTE put together. The second is from Oregon Fuel Injection. One of the links in Tugly's signature.

With only 164K miles..........at first I would initially not consider injectors as the problem. The mileage is kinda early for this to happen but it is not unheard of. Jason (HKusp) has first hand experience with this - it happened to him.

One trick/test others have done when all the starting requirements are met is to plug the engine block heater in for 3-4 hours and do a few buzz tests prior to starting a cold engine. The warmer block & exercising the injectors with a buzz test could help the cold start situation and help determine the next course of action.

If your buzz test doesn't sound like the video Tugly posted - then it's time to dig deeper.

 

You seem to have been very thorough. The only thing left to maybe do is try the glow plug module itself, but they aren't cheap either. If you can borrow a known good one, try that. But this sounds way too much like my truck a few years ago. It was injectors. I tried everything else first. Try 5w40 synthetic if you haven't already and plugging it in or keeping it in a heated shop, if it starts easier, it's injectors.

 

Was typing my response while you posted yours Rich.

 

I read all the oregon article, all the swampy article, motorcraft articles (and did their tests and wrote results on the warranty shee), soaked up all I could around here, and have had about 40 hours on me belly elbows deep in a dead 6.0L and a dead 7.3L in the last couple months, so I have done my homework before starting a thread! I do my best to comply with internet etiquette.

Thanks for the email with 400 page .pdf. That puts it all in one file and then some! I have only scrolled thru 100pages so far, but got the day off so I plan to do some homework.


I live by the Mexican border. Trucks around here don't come with block heaters.

 

Well I guess you won't need the block heater then!

 

The truck got towed to shop about a month ago complaining of hard start cold. It got to the point where they fried the starter. It would only crank for a few seconds and then let go. It then got one fresh battery and a fresh starter.

That is when I did an 8 hour day doing diagnosis. I traced MANY circuits, including glow plug circuit and found no faults. I visually checked for any abrasions of the wire harness and looked for airleaks and didn't detect any.

I checked oil rez level, visually checked for fuel pump operation by pulling fuel filter and then watching for flow with key on. It was there. Fuel pump obviously works. Duh, truck did eventually start! That's not to say pressure might have been too low cold, but "probably" not the issue. I didn't bother going into deadhead pressures, pump inlet vac/pressure drop or whatever Ford speaks of (ha), or any further fuel system tests.

A seasoned pro from the building told me to look into the fuel bowl for level rising while cranking. It did NOT rise. The argument is that sometimes when injectors fail the pressure ends up in the fuel bowl. It did not. No dark colored fuel in there either. NICE and clean.

I have essentially narrowed the diag down to the injectors. At least in my own head. I just wanna make sure I didn't miss something, so thanks for all ideas!

Recap:

-one month ago, truck towed to shop in 80+ degree F weather and it was a hard start. LOTS of cranking during diag eventually got it to go. It had a ICP Voltage code, CAM sensor code, but I disregarded them because I assume they showed up from when the driver swapped the cam sensor (parts bazooka) and fired an oil filter, and an IPR clean at it and failed. Thats when it got sent to us. Being a tech is kinda like a doctor, lawyer, detective; you have to sort thru the miscommunication, misinformation, lies, clues, and data and do your best! I cleared the codes once it got running and they didn't return. We let it cool down after the end of the day and they a day or two later, bossman claimed his intake air heater relay swap fixed it, I was VERY skeptical. He kept claiming it was the glow plug relay even though there is a damn large guage wire coming off it directly to the intake. Not where near glowplugs!!!! grrr. I posted here that it got fixed, but then got the comeback phonecall.

-this week, went back out to trokay after a call that it was no longer starting cold. This time, temp was colder, I wasn't sweating this time, wore a jacket, and it was probably about 50's with wind chill. 60's on the guage. It would crank and crank and try to catch, but no start. Got to the point where the batteries were starting to die. I collected as many data paramaters as I could and did screenshots.

No block heaters on cars this far south. I have heard of a guy that shoved a heating element down his dipstick in the winters back east. (heads to google)

So is it injectors?!!!! ha, thanks guys.

 

So change the oil to 5w40 synthetic, have it inside a warm shop, above 70 degrees and see if it starts then. The whole, once it's warm it continues to start for the rest of the day thing is what is leaning me very far to the -it's injectors- side. You have new CPS, new IPR, new intake heater relay, ha and good ICP, RPM, and voltage while starting. Fuel in bowl and at least enough fuel pressure to start the truck once it warm starts. What else could it be? Try warm thin oil. If it starts, the poppets on the injectors are worn. If not lets look elsewhere, but honestly, I think you have your answer, but I am just a doctor, what do I know?