Got me on this one. New batteries, new alternator, and still this charging problem. Don't know if 23mA is a big draw but that should take a year to drain a pair of our batteries anyway, not the weeks it's taking you. With the charging current you're measuring I don't see it's earthing either, unless the glow plugs stay on. With these symptoms I would initially think batteries, but it seems not.

 

The invoice just lists one alt.(4U2Z-10V346-CFRM), and one VR listed only at 10C359
The total bill was $422 plus tax. I didn't watch what the tech did with the alternator, he did take it over to the bench and use the impact gun on something. I just figured it wasn't phased right or something.
It was a brown cardboard box with a mostly white Ford label.
I normally wouldn't have taken it to a dealer but I had gotten an oil change deal in the mail so I took it in for the oil change. While it was there it failed to start for them. I had bought the batteries there since it was close to where I bought the truck, so I figured that since they sold the batteries, if they were bad they might as well change them.
The batteries were also replaced under warranty at that point, they were only a bit over 4 months old. The guy tested the batteries and arbitrarily just swapped in a new set under warranty. He then tried starting the truck, it started up and ran, he pulled it in for the oil change and fuel filter. He shut it down to go get the parts then decided to use a different lift and the truck wouldn't start the third time on the brand new batteries. He again swapped out the batteries before coming to me to say he thinks it may need an alternator. It hadn't done all that before. After leaving with the new batteries, alternator and fresh oil change, I went home, parked it in the garage and left it there for a week or so. It started twice the day I had to move it, but again failed to start the third time.

Something I notice is that when the batteries go below 11.89 volts, in the cab, its as if they're completely dead, the dash goes out, the radio loses its program, and the gauges all reset and act erratic. The batteries however are not completely dead. They are still able to pass a load test at the reduced voltage. It won't crank, I just here the solenoid snapping repeatedly. I can tell when its not right, the initial crank speed is off and it takes longer to fire up. When the batteries are fresh, or just charged, it fires almost instantly with the first touch of the key. It only does this once when the batteries are fresh, once its seen a glow cycle, regardless of how long its ran or been driven, the volts never return to the 12.65v level. They stay around 12.15v assuming I don't try to make more than two starts without a long drive or a recharge.

I still say its as if the voltage that's present at the battery cables while its running isn't getting into the battery. Only a long slow trickle charge revives them.

When I signed up here, it rejected the 6.0L name as too few letters but it sent me the email to confirm anyway so I did. I guess I got lucky, for once.
It was actually accidental, I had typed in something else, it rejected it as being taken, the form then suggested a few names, I was back spacing trying to change one of the suggested names when I bumped the enter key and it went through, but it came right back with a red warning that the name had too few letters. It was late and I gave up, the next morning there was a confirmation email in my inbox so I went with it.

 

If the glow plug relay was sticking on, it would kill these batteries in an hour or less not days or weeks.

One thing that comes to mind here is that as far as the batteries taking a charge is that I've got an old camper here that doesn't get much use other than as a hang out shack down by the pond. I have the old battery out of my Lincoln Town Car sitting on the tongue of the trailer with two wires and a trailer jack plugged into the trailer. It gives me lights and radio in the camper down there. Fully charged, that battery lasts about 8 hours with the lights on and radio playing. The battery is old, I replaced it after it passed its rated life in the car.
I run it down to about 8 volts all the time, I then bring it up to the shed and put it on an old Sears charger for a few hours. It comes back to 12.6 volts every time in short order. I find the longer I charge it, the longer it lasts even though the volts are already back up. I generally leave it connected anywhere from four hours to over night, and its been left on a lot longer a few times as well. But my point is that battery jumps right back to life, the voltage jumps up in a matter of hours every time. More than once I've grabbed it to jump start the tractor or this truck as well.
I can't see why these new batteries in the truck, also 65-850 batteries, don't recover voltage without a long drawn out trickle charge. That junk battery, bounces back almost instantly voltage wise. I believe that battery is a Johnson Controls Walmart battery from around 2009 or so..

One of the reasons I was quick to just buy a second set of batteries at first was that I kind of figured that since nearly every vehicle I've got here uses the same battery, I could always use the one's coming out of the truck in one of my cars. My Crown Vic is getting near the 5 year point on its battery so I swapped in one of the just replaced interstates that came out of the F250 after charging it for a long time to get it back up to full charge. I put it in my CV and it did the same thing it did in the truck, it gives me only a few starts before the volts drop and it labors when starting. I put the old battery back in. The Interstate battery was replaced less than 3 weeks ago, (the Fri. before Christmas). This again tells me something is happening to these batteries somehow in this truck.

 

Thank you. To me, this part number explains a lot.

Take note of the "RM" in the suffix of that part number.

The prefix and the suffix of any given Ford part number is really how they are distinguished from each other. The central part of the part number merely describes what type of part it is. In this case, almost every Ford alternator is described as 10V346. This is called the "basic" part type. How one alternator (or 10V346) is distinguished from another... including by model year, vehicle platform, revision, supercession, production vs service part, and whether or not the part is rebuilt... are all coded into the prefix and suffix.

In the case of the regulator, only the "basic" part type is shown. In this case, almost every voltage regulator is described as 10C359. Without a prefix and a suffix, we don't know what voltage regulator you appear to have paid extra for. Voltage regulators that fit in the same alternator can have very different means of excitation. Some are PCM controlled, others are not, even though both types can be physically indistinguishable from each other, but for the color. I'd be curious to know what the prefix and suffix to this extra voltage regulator that is on your invoice, and I think if I were in your shoes, I would ask the dealer a few questions about why it was ordered, because...

4U2Z-10V346-CFRM ships with a voltage regulator, the correct voltage regulator for a 2003 Ford F-250 with a 6.0L diesel engine... already installed. Ford does not ship these to dealers or parts distribution houses without regulators installed. If the dealer stated that the alternator "came out of the box without a voltage regulator", that would raise my alarm bells to full ring. In fact, that is what called my attention to your posts. But that isn't the only thing that the dealer apparently said that would raise my alarm bells.

Earlier, I said take note of the RM in the part suffix. That's because RM stands for "ReManufactured". Any Ford part number that has RM at the end of the suffix is a reman. It is not "brand new". If you doubt this, simply google your part number, and look at the many listings of Ford parts dealers, eBay, and Amazon. They will all disclose the fact that the alternator part number listed on your invoice is a Remanufactured Alternator Assembly, not "brand new".

So, this remanufactured alternator, missing a voltage regulator, lends some significance to the next thing that you said, which is

"I just figured" is another way of saying "I assumed".

And here is where the answer to your problems may be hidden.

Your assumptions.

Are the wires in your 16 year old truck really OK, or are you, as you have demonstrated above, simply assuming so, based on indoor storage and ultra low mileage?

Could rats or mice have nested in a decade long stored and stationary vehicle, and chewed through an area where you haven't been able to look?

Since you had a technician do the work, and not yourself, are you assuming that the tech inspected the entire run of lead from end to end?

Could the leads be intact, but the fusible links separated?

Could the location where you are measuring voltage, and the circumstances under which you are measuring voltage, not be conducive to the conclusions that you are deriving from those measurements?

If the voltage regulator was indeed changed out of the alternator that otherwise already ships with a voltage regulator, was the correct voltage regulator for the excitation scheme of your model year installed?

If the alternator you received from the dealer really was missing a voltage regulator, then could the voltage regulator have been robbed out of it by a previous purchaser, and if so, what other parts were swapped (rectifier bridge / diode plate assembly, etc). Was the alternator "returned"?

Even if the alternator as finally installed by the dealer is correct, the overriding impression I have from reading your comments is fraught with a lot of assumptions that for the better good of a proper diagnosis... I would try and let go of, and start over, assuming nothing. You mentioned being a tech yourself for 30 years, so I would start by getting back to the basics of a diagnostic tree, following each step religiously, and in sequence.

 

I believe Y2KW57 nailed it --- throw out the assumptions, but I'd rule out the batteries given the number of swaps (I have 6-yr old Motos in a 2006 I'm tearing apart today and they do just fine on the conductance tester). My observations:

- 150A glow plug load on ramp is suspect, high since those glow plugs typically are around ~10A each. I'd like to know what it's doing throughout its 1-120 sec (Ford Spec) cycle. If that ramp is only instantaneous than it's ok, but if current persists then there's a problem...........

- Normal (flooded) batteries don't like the run cycle (low miles) you're doing..............I use AGMs in my tractors as I don't drive them as much.....

- I've seen otherwise normal (sane) people get wrapped around the axle on this forum over alternators --- the damn Motorcraft stuff works just fine, everything else is overkill.

Diagnostic likelihoods:

Batteries 0%

Parasitic Draw 5% (in spite of the fact you used a disconnect, the test lamp didn't show it (really depends on the lamp's impedance, current needs plus I've seen so-called "disconnects" introduce problems)

Out of spec draws during start /run. Running / usage (run cycle) profile. Other wiring/electrical problem 95%

 

I checked the glow plug draw against both my 7.3L f350 as well as on several other 6.0L trucks, all gave me between 146 and 155 amps of draw on a cold motor.
The same with the starter draw, which ranged between 312 and 477 amps on various powerstroke diesel trucks I had available to test.

If the chances of the batteries not being the issue, then why do the batteries that I took out of the 2003 6.0L carry the same problem over to the 1997 7.3L truck? Even after an extended charging, they're never able to withstand the glow/crank cycle more than twice. Either these batteries are not truly fully charged, which I highly doubt being that I've got at least a dozen various chargers here. Brand new batteries, off the shelf will start the truck many times, but soon end up down to the 11.89v point where they won't start the truck.
The alternator, whether new or reman, it was supposed to be new according to the service manager, and it came out of a Ford box, not a red label Motorcraft box.
The wiring on the truck is pretty simple, I've completely had the battery cables out of the truck and they look and test as new. There is no rodent damage, the truck was stored in the guys house, next to his pool table on a ceramic tile floor with white carpet between 'parking spaces'.
He had many other cars stored in there the same way, There was a no miles Jeep sitting just behind a massive TV and a late model Shelby Mustang sitting behind the couch in front of the TV. This area was between the actual garage, and the main house. The area was built like a dealer showroom, but up in the mountains in PA. The front and back walls were mostly glass windows, the rear looked out over some stream and he woods, the front faced the 'Carriage house' where he had a few dozen more vehicles stored. He had employees who did nothing but took car of the vehicles to make sure they stayed 'new' looking. The truck was stored on stands with wheels, the tires a mere 1/4" off the floor. The batteries were removed, two plastic 'dummy' batteries were in the truck. The fuel tank had fuel, but only enough to keep it primed. The glass had built in 'sun shades' that would tint or close when the sun was out.
The guy was some sort of stock market trader or investor. I was told he had several places like that one around the country, all full of cars and collectibles. My garage here is heated, and very sealed. The floor is heated concrete, the walls are faux log over 2x6 construction with R22 insulation. It was built originally to be a vet clinic for the original owner but it was never finished. I added two large overhead doors when I bought it. If it were empty, I could park 5 vehicles on each side. There are no windows.
The center wall houses all the power, tool boxes, and work benches. The overhead doors are on adjacent walls. I keep two of my cars, my van, and the 03 Superduty in that building, along with my one JD tractor, and my camper. The other vehicles are parked either in the pole building down back or in the barn at the other end of the driveway. I have never had a rodent problem, the huge number of snakes, hawks, and golden eagles around here due to the pond and stream that run through the place seem to keep the small furry things under control.

I rarely leave anything outside, especially during the winter.

The alternator is charging, there is no voltage drop from the back of the alt. to the batteries. I have 66-67 amps being pumped to the batteries after start up at 14.7 volts, yet the batteries don't respond. On my 1997, the starter and glow plug draw at start up is similar, as is the amps to the batteries but the batteries recover fast. On the '97, after a cold start, the batteries which are at 12.58 volts. After a glow cycle and crank, they're down to 12.27, but after only 2 or 3 minutes at idle they're back up to 12.41v. After a short ride around the property, they've been recharged and show 12.59 v. That does not happen on the 2003. Plus, if I take the new batteries that just got charged which were in the 03, and swap them into the 97, those batteries do not recover and won't make a second start in that truck. (I have not taken the batteries from the 97 and put them into the 03, in fear of killing another set. I took the Walmart batteries back today, got a fresh pair, the truck starts and runs fine, acts normal. But it does every time its got new batteries. Its also been warm out.
I also swapped the original alternator back in, and will take the new one to be tested as well but since the voltage and amps are identical with both alternators, I don't suspect the new alternator will show any issues on the bench tester.

A few things that do concern me a bit, but after testing a few other 6.0L trucks it seems to be the norm, is that the normal running voltage on these is lower than the older vehicles. Every last Ford product I've got besides this truck runs at a normal 14.2 to 14.4 volts, these run around 13.7 volts if the alternator is not going full bore. I tested several 6.0L trucks on a local used car lot, each one had a standing voltage of less than 12.30 volts, many were under 12.20 volts.

 

It is common to get up to 200 amps at first on the glow plug current draw on a 6.0L . It should settle down to the 10-12 A per glow plug fairly quickly.

 

Would you PLEASE check the glow plug draw 3 to 4 minutes after it starts.

 

I have an old 6 amp / 2 amp Schumacher battery charger and a Battery MINDer smart trickle charger. The old charger works fine although if you saw it, many here would advise tossing it. But it works great. Of course, it's not smart and that is a very nice feature to "top off" a battery's charge without having to monitor the situation.

My batteries got pretty depleted awhile back and I put my trickle charger on it. The next day I came out to check on it and got really low voltage with my Fluke meter. Couldn't figure out how it got worse and wondered if there was a short in my BatteryMINDer. Put the old charger on and it brought them back up. Ha! So I went snooping in the BatteryMINDer's manual and lo and behold, if the battery voltage is below 10.5 V, it will not charge it. Internal logic literally sets a minimum voltage of 10.5V before the charger will work. So parasitic draw had simply drained the batteries further. All that to say is, you might try charging first with your old charger until the minimum threshold voltage your smart charger requires is achieved, then swap to the smart charger to finish. That's assuming that is the issue and that your batteries aren't already toast. Sorry, I didn't read all the thread or all of your posts. They are quite lengthy.

Screenshot below of a Schumacher Charging table time from their manual for estimating time required to charge.

 

I got the Walmart batteries replaced again, I parked the truck in the back of the garage and installed the new batteries after a 4 hour bench charge. The standing volts after 10 hours is 12.52 volts. I'm not going to touch it for two weeks to see what the batteries read then.
I also ordered a dozen of these battery maintainers, they look a bit heavier duty than the Battery Tender brand one's I've got. ( )

The parasitic draw on the battery is .021-.023a. That draw is mostly just memory from the ECU and radio.
I will leave the battery switch on. It should be no different than it sitting on a car lot for sale for two weeks.

The chart above is similar to the one printed on the back of one of my chargers here. At 6a though, it takes over 25 hours to get these batteries back up to full voltage on any of these chargers.

I have tried getting the voltage up with an older charger and switching to a modern charger but I ran into two problems doing so. either the modern charger read 'fuol charge' too soon or it charged the battery for only a few hours never getting it to the full standing voltage. The smart chargers seem to condemn any battery with less than 11.99 volts. They will not charge the battery from the point where the truck won't crank, at 11.89 volts.
It seems they will only charge batteries that are still over 12v or a battery that only needs to be 'topped off''. A depleted battery is rejected as a bad battery.

The best chargers I own seem to be the 10 amp Sears models with the 12hr timer.

I've had issues in the past with newer chargers in the 1980's or newer period with diode failure in the charger itself. I've sort of hoarded the older chargers and buy them anytime I can find them because they've been the only thing I found reliable over the years. Since I've still got a few trucks that run 24v systems, I still maintain several 6/12/24v chargers as well.

I went to a different dealer and ordered a brand new alternator, the parts guy guaranteed it not to be a reman. I want one on the shelf just in case.

This thing is taking up too much of my time, if it continues to be a problem its getting stuck in a back garage to be dealt with at a later date.
its not as if I don't have other vehicles to use.

 

There are way smarter guys helping you on this but when I read standing volts at "12.52" I have to throw in my 2cents. 12.52 is not a fully charged battery. My healthy batteries sit above 12.7 fully charged.

 

I been following this thread with some interest, and I agree some of the 6.0 gurus here have given great advice. As an outside party I say it is not the batteries. Multiple batteries have been installed with the same problems. You stated you replaced the alternator but has it been verified as good. Now lets look at the problem (I am going to make a couple of assumptions to move on in the diagnostics). 1 It is not the Batteries, 2 The Alternator is working and not the problem. 3 Is the GPCM good? if so let move on. That leaves a short some where drawing the batteries down. The mostly likely culprits are either the Engine harness or one of the positive battery cables is ground to something. As the way TooManyToys likes to look at batteries follow the electron flow. Somewhere in the system there has to be a path for the electrons to go from the Negative to Positive side of the battery to draw down the charge. The electrons go from the battery thru the grounds to the engine block thru three circuits back to the positive side of the battery. The Starter, the glow plugs and the alternator. You have a short in one of those circuits.

 

The thread has reached the definition of insanity.

Twice I’ve asked about the glow plug function, which is the only logical draw that would be high enough to discharge the batteries to such depth (80amp) and cause the alternator to output it’s max at hot idle rpm (~55amp) after 20 miles of driving.

Again, let’s see some pics of the engine compartment.

 

Is there a fuse you can pull for the glow plug module? 1st thing I'd do is physically disconnect the entire glow plug circuit to confirm or eliminate that as the culprit. If you can store the truck in a garage with the block heater plugged in, there shouldn't be any trouble starting it without the glow plugs.

 

I can unplug the Glow plug module, its right on the valve cover below the alternator.
The glow plugs stay on roughly 30 seconds after the engine starts, less time when its warm out, more when its cold.
The problem is not a draw on the system when it sits. The draw I measure is nearly identical to all the other Ford vehicles I own that do not have a problem.
The problem is that the batteries do not recover from the glow plug cycle.
If I compare this to another truck, he voltage drop with the glow plugs on and resulting voltage after a cold start but on the other truck, the batteries survive multiple cycles without it not starting. On my 7.3L it'll still crank and start even if the batteries are run down a bit, the 6,0L will not. It refuses to do anything once the batteries go down to 11.89 volts.
I went down to a used car dealer who has several same year trucks on he lot, the glow plugs on mine, and both the other 6.0L trucks show the same amp draw as mine.

Battery voltage on two brand new batteries is 12.60v I put them on a charger for a couple hours before installing them, they come off the charger at 13.4v, they stabilize at about 12.65. Sitting on the bench overnight, they read 12.55. I put them in the truck, after two days now, I get 12.51v. I get 12.48 volts when I test the battery in my Town car, which has been sitting for about 5 days now..

I agree, standing voltage isn't what I'd expect but I've tried many batteries from four sources, so the batteries are not the issue, at least not from the start.
What I cannot get past is that the problem follows the batteries to the 7.3L truck once they've been in the 6.0L. For arguments sake, I took the last set of Deka batteries and put them in the 1997. That truck will start and stop off and on all day with no issues with its own batteries, but with the two week old batteries from the 2003 won't start that truck twice in 20 minutes. They go no better after a day of driving it around town.
That tells me the new batteries are damaged somehow. If the batteries are good, then why don't they work in the other truck which has had no issues?

The 6.0L truck can sit up to about 2.5 weeks before it won't start, the 1997 can sit for two months, maybe more.
My Town Car and Crown Vic can sit for 2 weeks and still start, any longer and the batteries are too low to start.
Which is why I bought all the battery maintainers, if its going to sit more than a week, it gets plugged in. Some vehicles sit for months, I don't always need or have the time to drive them. Which is why most have less than 10K on the odometer.

I also picked up a second '03 F250 this morning, and all black Super cab XLT FX4 short bed. It came from an elderly man who bought it new and only drove it 15,000 miles before hanging up his license and parking it in the garage for 10 years. I hauled it home on my equipment trailer, its been sitting unused for 10 years in his garage. I didn't try to start it yet, I wanted to pump out the tank and change the fuel filters first. I ordered a set of filters and a set of tires for it, its still got its factory BF Goodrich tires on it. I didn't need it but the price was right. It also needs a pair of bumpers, both have some parking lot rash likely from an 85 year old driver. The rear bumper is twisted on both ends, the front bumper has two dents down low from what I was told was from a small deer. I may be able to fix the front bumper, not sure yet The dents are small, and hardly noticeable unless you look close.
If it stops raining, I pull it outside and unload it off the trailer this weekend. If nothing else, it'll give me something to compare too.