How long should I be able to park my truck for unused?
Back in July of 2016 I put two new batteries in this truck. The day the original batteries died was a Sunday and all I could find at the time was Interstate. They were fine for about a year but now if I let the truck sit for a three or four weeks it won't start. After two weeks, I get only one chance to get it to fire up in the cold. When its warm, it pops off in five or six cranks.
I have five trucks and four cars, so none of them get driven daily. I tend to rotate my vehicles but the F250 is only here for towing, so if I don't have anything to tow, which I rarely do in the winter, it sits in the garage.
Since the weather turned cold in Dec., I've had issues having enough battery life left to power the glow plugs and get the thing fired up after about 4 weeks. Interstate warranteed the batteries in mid Dec.
When it does start, it only gets run for about 10 miles or so, so it may not be getting a full recharge after the glow plug cycle?
Now after its failed to start three months in a row, the batteries don't appear to be taking a charge again.
The truck has minimum draw, maybe .021 amps or so, which I determined to be radio and ECM memory, and the alternator charges 14.47 Volts.
If I run it long distances and more often its fine but I don't use it that way.

Shouldn't it be able to sit for a month and still be able to start?
Interstate is blaming the truck now and doesn't want to warranty the batteries again. This was never an issue with the original batteries which lasted 12 years. (The original batteries didn't die completely, one battery quit taking a full charge, this was found after it started to crank more slowly in the cold).
The truck has only 15,500 miles on it, it lives in my heated garage year round, so there shouldn't be anything worn out or defective due to mileage.

 

A month is stretching it. If you know it is going to sit I would invest in a battery maintainer.

 

Cranking with low batteries is a FICM killer. If you know when your going to use the truck I would put a charger on it the night before and plug it in. If you don’t use it very often you need to find a trickle charger and keep it on the batteries when not in use.
The 6.0 doesn’t like to sit and not be used especially the turbo and the unison ring so get it out and drive it hard.

 

When I do use it, mostly in the warmer months, it gets driven longer distances. Usually towing my boat or camper. During the winter, it only goes out when I need to go to the dump. I did put a timed outlet in the garage for the block heater but since the place is heated, I've never needed to plug it in. I thought about putting one of those trickle chargers under the hood, but up until this set of batteries its never been an issue.
I'm thinking of tossing the Interstate batteries but don't have a clue what to try.
I used to run Deka in all my cars but they aren't what they used to be and the last five I bought all died in less than a year. I've got Walmart batteries in four of my cars, they've been fine for a few years now but I see they are no longer made by Johnson Controls, so I'm leery of buying my truck batteries there.
Something that really caught my attention is how light the new batteries are compared to the originals. The original batteries were super heavy, close to a hundred pounds lifting them out of the battery box was a real chore, the new batteries are light, maybe 60 lbs or so. They're supposed to be their best battery. MT7-65. They cost me $550, (I was stuck on the road and had no choice but to buy what was available on a Sunday). These are AGM batteries, they're supposed to be Interstates best battery. Apparently not. The worst part was they modified the battery box to make the right battery fit which still irritates me. I can't imagine why a company would make a group 65 battery that doesn't fit where all others do.
The left battery box was longer and didn't need modifying or cutting.

If sitting will ruin the turbo then this truck is doomed. It was bought for a purpose and is only used for that purpose. The farthest I drive it around here is to my shop once in a while when I need to work on something, but even that's only a 10 mile round trip from the house. Not hardly enough to recover the battery charge from a cold start.
What I'm finding is that the Interstate batteries can't run the glow plugs twice, if it don't fire the first time in the cold, the second cycle of the glow plugs kills the batteries. They were fine for a few months but now they're going dead faster. I had them on an 8 amp trickle charge all day yesterday and they still just barely got the truck started. I needed the truck to take my boat out to do some work on it but it let me down. I ended up using my Ranger to tow the boat instead, that sits for months without being run and starts every time with a Walmart Everstart battery I put in it back in 2012.

 

 

I have left my truck sitting for up to 6 months at a time with no issue, the key is you can not arm the alarm (do not lock the doors or place the alarm in active mode). I did that once (alarm in active mode) and came back after 2 months to totally dead batteries. I still have the original Motorcraft batteries installed.

I’veheard And read tons of discussions on brands and types and personally I typically use NAPA Gold batteries, then Interstate by choice. I normally get 5 to 7 years out of most any battery I buy and so am happy. I just check the fluid levels and when low add just distilled, not purified water. Never add electrolyte as it will change the chemical concentration and cause early failure of the plates.

If you plan on putting the alarm in active mode (depressing the lock button twice) then yes put a battery maintainer (not a trickle charger, they are different) on it. I have because I must leave my truck locked up outside at my house on the coast and I don’t have any issues.

 

A Interstate had a guy from a local dealer come out and change the batteries again. He said the truck had the wrong batteries and that a Powerstroke can't survive on the AGM type batteries since they take longer to charge and don't have as many CCA's.

Now, after he put the new batteries in it, the gas gauge is reading empty, and the ABS light is on?

There are no codes in the the ABS system.
The funny thing is he left the old batteries here, I'm not sure if he forgot them or didn't want them? When I sent him a text to remind him he said he wasn't equipped to take two old batteries with him and to "do with them as I please".
They do charge back up, they just don't hold that charge for more than a month. Maybe I can use them individually in one of my cars? Everything I own takes a group 65 battery.

 

I drove the truck about 15 miles then the ABS light went out and the gas gauge started working again?
I checked the charging system, all is normal, with the new batteries, I have 14.7 volts running, 12.56 volts after it sits for an hour. I filled the tank, the gauge registered full and it took 15 gallons, so it wasn't empty, but at about half tank. Somehow when the batteries were changed it lost track of how much gas was in it? I tried it again, and got the same thing, when I cut the power, the gas gauge goes to zero until its driven and restarted a few times?

I'm thinking about adding a volt meter of some sort to this thing, that way if its down, I won't even hit the glow plugs and kill it totally before trying to crank it.
Its got an engine temp gauge, trans temp gauge, fuel gauge, and oil pressure gauge, but no battery volts or amps. I'd like to see a real time volt meter too.

 

Well glad it’s up and running. As for a volt meter they sell some on amazon that you can put into the power port to check the reading with. You might also look into getting a Scangauge II with that unit you can program PID’s to watch while your driving and keep an eye on things before they become a problem.
One problem with the 6.0 is the oil cooler I’m sure your aware but if your not watching the temp difference between the oil and coolant you could have issues with the oil cooler plugging up and causing the EGR cooler to not have the coolant flow it needs and could potentially crack the EGR cooler sending coolant to the cylinders which in turn will lift the heads.

 

With as many vehicles I have here, and how often this truck gets used, it likely won't see 25,000 miles in my lifetime. It took 15 years to get the first 15K on it. When I travel they all sit, sometimes for a year or more.
It will get a good run this week, I've got to run down south to pickup another truck with my car trailer, it should put roughly 800 miles round trip on it.
We don't have state inspection here, couldn't I just get rid of the EGR mess? It gets a pure synthetic oil change every 3,000 miles, I've been running 5W40 Delo 400LE oil. (I got 2 bulk barrels of it that were bought for this and four other diesel trucks here). I also bought a few cases of Motorcraft oil filters for these. (I have four of these trucks, three 2003's and one '04). The 04 has almost 40K on it so it will be leaving soon, I got my price and it should be getting replaced with a new truck in the next few weeks, but I'm not sure if I want to deal with the newer diesel and added DEF fluid. I'd rather have another 1997 again. I should have kept that truck but I wanted an extra cab and the 97 sold for almost what I paid for it new after almost 20 years. If the core support didn't rust out for no reason, I'd still have it, it only had 12K on it.

 

I never heard of a factory alarm on these trucks? On mine, pressing the lock button twice beeps the horn but that's all it does. There is no alarm. If I lock the doors then open a door from the inside, nothing happens. As far as I know its only keyless entry in these years.

 

My '04 F350 had a alarm on it and it was a Ford unit. It worked with my remotes. Would not allow the engine to crank when engaged. I found it out the hard way when locking with the fob but unlocking with the keypad. No crank, wtf? It turned out I had to hit the unlock button on the remote to get it to crank.

 

I AGREE, Battery Maintainer can be had for $25-$50 on sale (NT), and may even restore the life in your abused/ neglected batteries.

Emergency Generators crank/ run weekly for a MINIMUM-30-minutes, and they have a constant trickle charger, and 30-min UNDER FULL LOAD MONTHLY. Luck to you :-)

 

Battery tenders are cheap and a lot easier to connect to a truck than how I have to connect to my bike.

 

I'm reviving this thread as a follow up.
Its been just over a year since the last post here.
I still have issues with keeping the batteries up on these trucks, it seems that if I don't give the batteries a full and complete charging at least once a month, the truck has battery issues.
What gets me is that even if the truck starts, or barely starts, the alternator never seems to bring the batteries back to 100%. I have to use a trickle charger.
I noticed this a few times now. Last week, it seemed to be cranking slower and taking longer to start, I checked the battery volts and it was at 12.56 on both batteries.
The truck started, and I had to make a 2 hour drive so I went, and took two of my jump packs with me just in case. The truck started and ran fine all day, I did about 288 miles that day. The battery situation was the same when I got back, it cranked slower than normal and took about 8 revolutions to fire up. Driving 5 hours that day on the highway, during the day, didn't help the batteries. The next morning, the truck wouldn't crank over at all.
(The batteries were again new in March, and the battery seller removed and tested the alternator and told me it was able to make 110 amps plus under load. The charging voltage is 14.47 volts.)
I put the truck on trickle charge all day, the next day it cranked up like its supposed to, the battery volts were 12.67v and both batteries pass a load test at their rated amps.
Something else I figured out on these is that the batteries will not survive a second glow cycle and retain enough power to start the engine. On a couple of really cold days, I hadn't had the truck plugged in. When I cranked the engine over it huffed a lot of smoke and didn't fire right up, so I cycled the key and started the glow plugs again, but it killed the batteries. All the starter would do is click after that. I charged the batteries and it started right up.
The temp was something like 2°F that morning. At home, I normally leave it inside my heated garage so I don't have to plug it in. I found it cheaper to heat the garage then to run the block heaters on 7 vehicles.

Why on earth won't the batteries recover or gain charge while driving? Any other car or truck I've owned would charge and maintain its batteries on its own.
If it were only the one truck I'd say its a problem with that truck but I get the same issues with all four of my trucks. None get more than maybe 500 miles of use per year, and all four now have battery tenders installed but I hadn't been using the Battery Tender on the truck I was currently driving at any given time. I only connect it when it goes back in the garage for an extended period. The truck sits for anywhere from three days to three weeks at t time, I have a company car that I drive most often, my personal vehicles stay home in the garage.


Another issue I have, with all four, is that when the batteries go down and I have to trickle charge them, the gas gauges get screwed up. After charging the batteries, (didn't disconnect them), the dash goes through some sort of sweep test upon first start up after charging. All the gauges except the gas gauge sweep full right, then to zero then they start working. The gas gauge doesn't do anything, it reads empty for a few days, or more. It slowly comes back to normal each time. It seems to have to learn the range of the sender somehow. It'll take a few tank fulls of fuel for it to work right after a battery swap or recharge.
Is there a way to expedite this? Right now my gauge reads near empty and the low fuel lamp is lit. The tank if topped to the max.