So my dieselrx plugs gave up the ghost after three years of abuse. I didn't plug in at all this winter and maybe was a little hard on the push-button a couple times. Been hard to start this week and yesterday it didn't start at all. Which is a problem because it was in the upper 30's and that isn't too bad usually. The usual hum that I hear from the GP relay went silent about 4 seconds in to the burn and, after that, nothing. Truck just wouldn't chooch.

I thought it might have been a bad relay, so I replaced that. Still nothing. Confirmed 12v at the GP's with a meter. Okie doke, I'll just go finally put in some Berus. Nobody has them around me. Like, NOBODY. One store had one in stock. I need 8. So I went online and ordered a set. Gonna be a week.

Can I be without my truck for a week? I prefer to lie to myself and say no while ignoring my other perfectly fine-ish vehicles. So what is a guy to do? There was only one set (8) of 6.9 IDI plugs at a single store within 25 miles, and they were the infamous autolites. So I did the right thing and bought them, installed them, and am enjoying the fact that the truck now start and runs. (Side note, none of the DRX plugs swelled)

I will, of course, be doing this job again soon when the Beru's arrive and weather permits. It was 46 degrees today. February in Michigan. I figured it was a sign. And I should hopefully have an emergency set of autolite glow plugs in the future.

Pray for me.

 

Good luck. Let us know when those Berus come in that you ordered.

 

where did you order the plugs from? amazon and evilbay have a LOT of unscrupulous people selling cheap chinese knockoffs as real motorcraft plugs.
to be honest, if my plugs stopped working and my only option was autolites, i would buy a can or two of ether and use that sparingly until i could get a set of real motorcraft plugs.

 

Well. Best I can tell, the Autolites worked twice. They are now dead, as well. And the Beru's still have not shipped (Dieselfiltersonline) - I assume at this point they did not have them in stock because the price was pre-pandemic. The snort of fluid method has now been employed twice.

Now, I have to wonder what could be causing these plugs to fail. Manual switch. - still getting ~12V at the glow plugs (11.x, when battery is at 12.x). Is there a fusible link somewhere? I am getting stumped. Dash light comes on and relay clicks when I push the button.

 

autolite glow plugs should be banned for sale, and anyone selling them for fords should be arrested for theft.
i have NEVER seen an autolite glow plug last more than 4 startups in a ford.

 

For science, I just checked the DRX plugs I took out. 3/8 were less than 1 ohm. The others were all of it/wouldn't read.

I also followed up with Dieselfiltersonline customer service. "Looks like we are a few shy of having the 8 for you, the rest are arriving in our Motorcraft delivery that is due in Friday I believe. Will that work ok for you?" I suppose it will have to.

I am tempted to buy some more DRX plugs, but this fiasco is getting way too expensive if I do that. I have paid the price for impatience; hopefully the autolites all come out ok.

 

Just an update. I pulled all the autolites. They all swelled. EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. This was less than 15 seconds TOTAL, not all at once, TOTAL.

The Leroy glow plug extractor is worth its weight in gold.