Ok for those of you who care. I pulled or partially pulled the oil cooler and the pressure valve is stuck tight . haven't gotten it all the way out yet. what a job. don't know how i'll get it the rest of the way out or some of the bolts back in without raising the engine. I think this will break me from ever owning another diesel. Lesson learned.

 

There is a writeup somewhere on doing the cooler in the truck. I think some people bolt the front part to the block, then use a prybar to press the rear 2 parts onto it. You are going to want new orings for where the center seals to the outers. Lube them up good with lithium grease or something. I remember some people having trouble with aftermarket orings, but I got some felpros for mine.
These engines are pretty reliable once you get th bugs worked out.

 

Just unbolt the engine mount, and either jack the engine a bit or pull on it with a cherry picker to get some clearance.

It's seriously not a big deal. Even pulling the engine isn't particularly hard if you have a few tools and an impact wrench. I've done it in half a day before.

 

I put the engine in this truck so i been there and done that, the po rebuilt the oil cooler and it looked it but either he didn't replace the valve or it got some trash in it. I took a screw driver and smacked it in hard and it came free. feels a little gritty the other cooler i have doesn't look as good as this one but it's valve works smooth. I had to hoist the engine up and loosen the exhaust and finally managed to work it out. So my next choice is to use the used one which came from an engine that slung a rod or rebuild the new looking one. It doesn't leak and no signs of a leak, but it has the bad valve can you just replace the valve?

 

I think i'm going to try and get the valve out and clean it. I guess since it's staked in place i'll have to unstake it some how. Any suggestions.

 

Um... die grinder? Something to get in there and sand or grind the metal holding it in out.
Little air tools like a die grinder are plenty cheap at Harbor Freight, and the quality is fine for this sort of thing.

 

I just realized the felpro gasket and oring set igot, part no. Es72519 that I referenced earlier doesn't fit. Rock auto shows it for an idi but it looks like a psd set.

 

I got a die grinder but doesn't look like i can do any good with a die grinder. I'll keep at it. It's working really free right now tempted to put it back in but i'm afraid it'll just do it again.

 

If I were you I'd disassemble the spare oil cooler with the good relief valve, clean it all up, reassemble it with new o-rings and put it on the engine.

 

think I'm going to chance this one it's working as free as the spare one I have now. Just don't understand how it stuck before.

 

Ok took your advise and bit the bullet. broke it down and rebuilt it boy am i glad. the spare one ended up having replacement oil rings but the tube holes where badly rusted and the ends where full of crap. so I took both apart and made one good one with new o rings. Happy happy will put it back on in the morning. Just hope it holds up. sucks you can't get new pressure valve.

 

I pulled the oil cooler off of my newly acquired '89 F350 because there was water leaking around the aft/oil filter end cap. There was a spot where the aluminum end cap had completely corroded away causing the leak. Took it to a welder and had him Tig weld it back up.
When I pulled the end cap off I found that 6 or 8 of the water tubes through the cooler were completely clogged with rust and had to shove a welding rod with the flux knocked off down the tubes to clean them. The end caps were full of crap- even a piece of small diameter wire. How did that get in there?
I doubt that the cooling system on this truck had ever been serviced. All is well now.

 

I can sympathize with your feelings about working on a big heavy diesel pick-up (except for my final conclusions below) - At 66 years old and being very weak from a 20+ year long disability (began recovering from that last July but it will take a few years) along with chronic pain issues every day from shoulders to feet (which require morphine 3x/day just to be able to function - fortunately no back problem) I found myself thinking yesterday that my next vehicle will be a tiny one that doesn't have a bolt or nut over 15mm.

People who claim that these trucks are "so easy to work on" must be thinking about the lack of complexity of electronics and computers and surely not the muscle power it takes to work on them.

I started replacing the tie rod ends yesterday with Moog parts (doing the passenger side today) which is an easy job (I got a non-damaging tie rod end remover rented from the parts store, which I like much better than hammering on a pickle fork). Easy EXCEPT for removing the wheels!

I needed a 4 ft cheater bar on a 1/2 in. drive breaker bar to remove the 1-1/16 in. lug nuts - the threads are FINE (9/16 in. studs x 18 threads per inch) and the studs are unusually long so it took a LOT of turning with only 1/4 of a turn each time! Some of the lug nuts were tight all the way off and required (for me) the cheater bar - which means the lug nut threads got mashed by over-torquing by a tire shop impact set too high- something to be aware of at tire shops! - make sure that they don't over-torque the lug nuts! Les Schwab torqued my rear wheels to 150 lb.s and the spec is supposed to by 135 lb. on mine but after some corrosion sets in they may as well be 250 lbs as far as getting them off. It took more than 1/2 hour just to remove the lug nuts on one wheel at 1/4 turn at a time for the difficult ones!

THEN since I had the truck jacked up really high to get a 6 ton jack stand under the I-beam (tire about 7 inches off the ground - parked in the grass on rough ground) I could NOT lift that heavy tire and rim back onto the hub! I had to build a ramp from wood blocks to get the wheel back on.

Passenger side is going easier as I'm not going to use the jack stand- just my old 3 ton floor jack - just got the wheel removed and taking a short break.

I hope I never have to change a flat tire out on the road somewhere and that is what got me to thinking about having a tiny and easier to work on vehicle.

HOWEVER, I'll be replacing the lug nuts with squished threads and maybe clean up the threads on the studs) so it won't be so bad to change a tire. When I get all of the heavier work done I will LOVE this truck. I really would not want an F250 gas truck. The diesel is far better in my view. If your diesel engine is good you should like it when the problems are fixed.

One thing I really like about mine is the solid state 7.3 style glow plug controller. The timed after-glow substantially reduces exhaust smoke during warm up. Mine does not smoke at all after start up! I don't see any smoke in the mirrors while driving unless I really tromp on the accelerator but I almost never have a need to do that. I didn't buy this truck for a hot-rod.

So, yes I can sympathize with your feelings about the diesel but once it's fixed I don't think you could match the benefits of the idi diesel with a gas truck. The big wrecking yards for example are full of trucks with 460 cid gas engines but very few idi diesels. Gas trucks can be a pain in the neck to work on too - probably more work per mile during the time the engines are still good.

Oil cooler does not sound like fun, that's for sure but I can't think of much else on the idi diesel that is 'more difficult' than working on a gas engine which also has much more that can present problems.

Back to work on my tie-rod ends, clean up some rims for a tire swap and alignment on Monday.

Good luck with your oil cooler replacement and I hope you are happy with the truck afterward. Had it not been for several oil filter seals blowing out and making a big mess and the extra expense for new oil it probably would not be so very discouraging.

 

Got the oil cooler on and no leaks drips or errors. Started right up as it's hot here today. but the puffing persists. Don't believe my glow plugs are working so on to try and figure that out. I think maybe my injectors are next. runs great just puffs smoke. If this wasn't a rollback truck i'd have given up long ago. I Looked like a diesel mechanic when I got done with the cooler. getting too old for this crap. 66 and counting myself, 4 back surgeries, prostate cancer and a brain aneurysm, but i'm still kicking.

 

Don't forget the anti-seize .. my lugs get a wipe every time those nuts come off ..

Makes it much easier to take the wheels off .. that .. and an air ratchet. .. good gawd