Hello everyone,
I am new to the site. I have read numerous threads close to my situation but nothing quite right so Id like to post my situation and see what I get. Thanks for the advice in advance. I have a 2002 f350 dually with a 7.3 and 197k. At 186k it died while driving and I had it towed home. As soon as the tow truck dropped it the truck fired right up like nothing was wrong. Then it died again 2 days later. I replaced the cps, but the fix was replacing the icp and pigtail. Now it is doing the same thing again. It died on my wife while driving yesterday, i had it towed to the dealership I work at and it started and ran for about 2 hours with no issues. I hooked up the factory IDS and had a diesel tech look at it with me. The oil pressure, injector circuit and injectors, and IPR all look good. The batteries were a little weak so i replaced both of them. I drove it home yesterday, about 10 miles, and drove it around town today. Then i tried to jump start my 96 bronco and after about 10 minutes of running it sort of hick uped then 5 minutes later it died and would not start. I let it set for 30 minutes and it started and died after about a minute. I am scratching my head on this one. I work at a ford dealer and am not the only one lost with this one. Any advise on what to replace or test would be great.

 

How much fuel is in it.
Is your oil topped off.
Any tuner etc... a lil history.
Have you koeo drained the fuel bowl to see if you have good fuel pump pressure.
How does your fuel filter look.
Have you dropped the tank to see if your socks in the pickup are clean.
Does it run well and the just shut down or does it have any symptoms before it dies.

We all need the big picture to help with this. Tell us a good story and include details.

Denny

 

I have 3/4 of a tank of fuel. I just did an oil change 2 weeks ago and the oil is full. I have a TC tuner that was programmed by the manufacturer of the tuner and all i did was plug it in the pcm. I have not drained the fuel bowl to check fuel pressure. Do I take off the filter cap and watch the bowl fill up while someone cranks it? Or will a fuel pressure test on the rail tell the same story? I replaced the fuel filter about 5000 miles ago. I have not dropped the tank yet. I bought the truck used with 184k on it. The repairs in my original post are all i have done to it besides brakes, oil and fuel filter changes and a BG induction service. The truck starts and runs great while cold, after it warms up it just shuts off without warning. I apologize if i left anything else out. I am not sure what to look for with a diesel. I am learning as I go. I do not know how to check the hpop or if i should do a fuel pressure test. I really dont want to drop the tank unless absolutely necessary. Do these trucks have a separate fuel pump on the frame rail like the old dual fuel tank f150's?

 

Under your left butt cheek on the frame rail is your fuel pump.
With key on not running and everything else off, fan etc. You should hear it hum.

With the lid off the fuel filter canister. Behind and on the side you will see a yellow valve to drain your fuel bowl. You can drain it, have a helper key on to see how fast the bowl fills up. That's a quick indicator if the pump is actually up to snuff.

Your symptoms (to me) are pointing at a fuel delivery issue.

You could also disconnect the feed from the rear of your fuel pump and blow a couple of pounds of air back to the tank with your fuel cap off to temporarily clear the socks of debris. This is again, just an indicator of what could be the problem to eliminate the need to drop the tank. (It's free and easy).

You can unplug your tuner as well to eliminate that.

I do one thing at a time to isolate the cause instead of doing all at once and wondering which it was.

Denny

 

BTW, does it idle all day long while warm and only fail when under throttle warm?

 

Hello, welcome to the forum, there are many guys here that will give you some very good advice. One of the main things to think about is to not throw a lot of money at this and change everything under the sun and not hit on the cause. 186,000 miles is not overly a lot of miles. I have driven 7.3 with over 6000,000 miles on them
Every 'truck' may have more than one issue going on at the same time and when put all together... it dies, it will not start... it runs like junk....

One of the first things is 'how does it die'??? Is it like 'you turn the key off'??? Or is it a slow progression like being starved for fuel...

When at the place where you work, were you able to pull any codes from the truck?

A bad ICP should not kill the truck, it would run poorly, but should not kill it.

A bad CPS will kill it, but also, if the is not a good connection or moisture gets past the seals, it could also 'kill' the truck at the most odd times....Make sure that the CPS is tight to the block and put a little sealant grease on the rubber seal and make sure it is connected tight so no moisture gets in.

If I were you, I would (and did ) unplug the fuel bowl heater plug that is at the back of the bowl. It the heating element goes bad and pops the fuse, it will keep popping it until you fix the element or unplug it. You will not be able to start the truck with this fuse blown.

Have you changed your fuel filter? A good clean filter will really change the way the truck runs.

Buy one of these.
Equus Innova 3721 Battery and Charging System Monitor - Walmart.com

It will help monitor your glow plugs and when they turn on and off. How low your batteries go when cranking and if your alternator is putting out a good charge.

These trucks will not run (or start) if the voltage drops below 10.5 volts.

Oil pressure opens the injectors, the truck holds 15-16 qts. If the oil level falls around 8 qts, there is not enough oil pressure to open the injectors to get fuel to run the truck. If you are driving down the road and the truck slowly acts like it is starving for fuel, it may be that the injectors are slowly closing and the truck will run very badly and eventually die. Monitor your oil level.


9 Common Problems With 7.3 Power Stroke Diesel Engines, And How You Can Fix Them | Diesel IQ

Should be something easy, but tracking it down will be a little work.

Now.... were there any 'codes'?

 

It has died under throttle warm and died idling warm. Either way it takes a while to start again.

 

I did see some codes. But my batteries were weak so most of them were low voltage codes. Others were icp circuit high because I unplugged the icp and tried to start it to see if that was the issue again.

 

This sounds like maybe a bad IPR to me. Since you work at a dealership, can you get someone in service to let you hook up a CFR to it and drive it until it does it again? The data from that would probably reveal something.

 

I'm sure I can if we have one. What is a cfr?

 

Customer Flight Recorder. It works with the VCM-II for the IDS system.

 

Oh ok, thanks for all the info. I've got it running right now and I'm just waiting for it to cUT off again and I'll check the things you guys have mentioned. I'll let you know what I find.

 

When you said in the original post the IPR looked good did you mean on the diagnostic equipment or physically? if you haven't already then look at the connector going to the IPR and wiring for chaffing. Check the tin nut that holds the IPR solenoid in place

 

So the high pressure fuel pump on the frame rail is coming on as usual. But I do not hear the fuel pump in the tank neither koeo or while cranking. I lowered the skid plate and had someone crank it while I beat on the tank and it still didn't start.

 

And when I say the ipr was good I mean the data on the ids showed good according to the diesel tech that was looking at it with me. I can check it now but I don't know where the ipr actually is.