Back story:
I have a 1999 F250 SD in excellent condition that was backed into and the offender drove off. Insurance company told me to go get an estimate and wrote me a check. Instead of repairing the bed (not exactly horrible) I went looking for another bed to drop on my truck. I found a 2001 F250 SD that is a twin to mine. A farmer had it and had pulled the bed off years ago and put a flatbed on it. He has since put the original bed back on it (had it sitting in a shed). Bed is in perfect condition - truck has a few farmer dents on it but is in pretty decent shape for not rust through and Alcoa wheels. I bought the truck (V10, 166K, 4x4 extended cab) for $2400. My son saw the truck and wants to see if we can get it running good enough to be his "school" truck and he'll look at building a flatbed in shop class - for the time being my dented bed will go on it.

The Issue:
V10 auto that has sat for 3 years. Guy said it had a miss when they parked it in the corner of his shop. It now has 3 year old gas in it and there is a definite miss bit no other noticeable issues (no knocking, no smoke, no blown spark plugs). No check engine light is on - my truck will not trip the light when a COP goes bad but will still have a random misfire code). I hooked up my (very cheap) code reader and there are no codes stored. I don't know if the guy cleared the codes or it truly isn't missing bad enough to trip the codes. Battery is VERY weak and needs jumped at every start up.

Where do you start?




I told my son if all I had to do what replace some of the COPs or a fuel pump to get it running right I would be fine with it - if it goes beyond that I'm not going to sink a bunch of money into a truck that I have no idea on its maintenance.


Anyone know of a decent scanner (couple hundred dollars range) that would give information like the number of misfires on the individual pistons? Something that goes beyond the simple code reader for a DIYer?

 

welcome to this site
scanner wise i use a innova brand which has many models and prices,plus they are a sponsor of this sites https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/forum60/ section ,and also make the ones harbor tools sells under thier brand name.https://www.innova.com/collections/innova-obd2-scanners, places like advance auto parts has them from around $70.00 UP $300.00 buys the top model. some may chime in saying get forscan a russian program,issue now is paying for the software with the banns in place unless a work around has come up, again personal choice,
a 99 v10 has the bad heads that are known for blowing spark plugs, be very careful when replacing the plugs , as to what's making the miss,i would do a compression and leak down test,before doing anything, when replacing COPs also replace the boot at the same time, from there yes money can leave the wallet very fast

for way more advice, please check out out V 10 area where many of us old time v10 owners have amassed and posted a ton of help, https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/forum49/ where there's over 20 years of work kept

 

Thanks for the heads up on the V10 forum.

I am familiar with the Triton/modular engines - and honestly not a big fan. My 1999 only has 30K on a Jasper rebuild and only 10K on a rebuilt transmission. We (I have 3 sons that are all driving F series) have had great success with the 1987 to 1996 F150s/F250s keeping them running well and making the needed repairs. Digging into a modular of any size seems to get very expensive and complicated compared to repairing a 351W.

 

Low battery can cause issues. I would get that charged up and old gas drained out before anything else.

Do not try to charge a low battery back up with the alternator. That can be very hard on them and cause early failure. Given how many electronics are on these trucks if you don't have a fully charged or at least very close to fully charged battery you won't have enough voltage to operate everything as it should be.

Modern fuel blends are lucky to last 6 months before going stale especially if the gas has any ethanol in it.

If it were my truck I would charge the battery, drain fuel system, replace fuel filter, fill with some fresh gas and a bottle of techron or whatever your favorite fuel system cleaner is. Changing the spark plugs out wouldn't be a bad idea either. After that work is done I would take it on a good long highway drive to get some fresh fuel ran through the system. That will also help clear up any moisture in the crankcase from sitting for so long and clean some carbon off the O2 sensor. It will also get the cat plenty hot to clean out any carbon that may have built up in there too.

 

I recommend Forscan. It can read all of the codes (your cheap reader cannot read most of the codes,) read and display live data, and it can program modules, too. Get it FREE at www.forscan.org. If you want to do more than read codes you'll need to buy a license. Their page also shows how to select an adapter to plug into the OBDII port. I bought mine from Amazon for about $30.

 

I bought a 2000 F250, with the V10, with 168k. Had a mild/moderate skip. First thing I did was plugs and wires, but still had an issue. I then did coil packs and she ran like a new truck. I also ran a thing of Royal Purple cleaner through it. She runs like a top now. Of course I haven’t stopped there, and I’m replacing all things a little at a time, because literally almost everything on it is the original parts. So far calipers, rotors, pads, front end parts etc. This truck is a beast and crazy tough, but 25 yrs old parts can only take so much. Good luck !!