in reading some of the other post about hard starting in the cold(i am having this problem)the glow plugs and or batteries were mentioned.is the a check to see if the glow plugs are bad and if so what is it?my batteries and a year old and shoud not be the problem.if the plugs need to be replaced how do you go about doing it? they are under the valve cover correct? if so will i need a new set of V.C. gaskets?i heard they were reuseable?in cold weather should i run #1 diesel or should #2 be good all winter.i live in wisconsin and it is getting cold about ten or so.i cant plug the truck in during the day at work for 10-12 hours, but in the morning after two hours of plug in time she fires right up. thanks. jack k

 

Glow plugs are under the valve covers and the valve cover gaskets are reusable.
The easiest way in my opinion to check the glow plugs is with an ammeter. Each glow plug draws about 30 amps so when you first switch on the key, with an inductive ammeter on the battery cable (or the glow plug cable) it should indicate 320 amps, give or take 20 amps with 8 functioning glow plugs. To determine which glow plugs are burnt out, unplug the connector(s) on the valve cover gasket connection. The outer pins will be the glow plug pins. If your valve cover gasket has 2 connectors on each side it will be the outer pins on each connector (the first and last pin in each connector) and if only one conector on each side it will be the outer 2 pins or the first 2 and the last 2. Check them with a dead light or an ohm meter to ground. Another thing to check is whether you've got 12 volts at both lugs of the glow plug controler when the glow plugs are on. If you don't, then the solenoid is bad (it is on a bracket toward the front and above the right bank valve cover). Those solenoids are prone to failure (they look like a Ford starter relay).