The Duramax with its aluminum heads was suppose to have all sorts of headgasket and head warping problems but it never has. The cast iron head 7.3 PS never had any headgasket issues either. But the cast iron head 6.0 PS is having problems blowing coolant out the overflow tank the result of the headgaskets unable to hold combustion from leaking into the water jacket. This is happening on stock trucks and modified trucks with chips or tuners.

WHY?

Well, comparing V8 Diesels from GM and Ford. The Duramax has 22 bolts per head, the 7.3 PS has 18 bolts per head and the 6.0 PS had 10 bolts per head. The 6.0 PS doesn't have enough clamping between the block and the head with only 10 bolts. Is this a design problem or did Ford bump up the power more than International designed the motor to handle?

 

I have never bought into the whole aluminum thing anyway. Nothing wrong with aluminum heads. Been used in racing for a long time now. It could be lots of things causing the blown head gasket problem. Anything from a poor run in the casting, improperly spec'd head gaskets to not enough head bolts.

Concerning the last its not about clamping force. The clamping force is no different with 10, 18 or 22, torque on the head bolts would be the same. The difference is 10 would allow more flexing than 18 will. This gets back to the type of steel used for casting the heads. Even steel shifts as its heated and cooled.

The big problem though is so far there does not seem to be rhime nor reason to the problem. If it was a major problem we would see it more. My personnel opinion is there is a bad casting run and that is causing the problem.

 

Mike,

I'm curious why do I see you posting on every ford site,and trying to get a rise out of people.

 

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lol, someone got busted. i have never heard about a head gasket problem out of the 6.0 PSD. but i have heard about a ton of probs the duramax is having. ones that are far far more sever then the PSD ever has had and the allsion trany is not much either.

 

Every diesel will have problems if your are going to add allot of power that will add cylinder pressure and boost.And yes there have been dmax's that has had thier headgaskets replaced and yes the 6 liter has problems keeping coolant in.

 

Ah sounds like you know this person up close and personal. You know his name. Yah it seems like all his posts are duramax No. one everyne else last. He does try to stir up the pot. Oh well we all know whos no. 1. He just likes to think hes hot stuff. Sounds like me. Im hope Im not that bad.

 

Hmmm ... what was the topic of this thread? Oh yes ..gaskets vs longevity or something like that. OK ..carry on.

 

I guess I would like to hear opinion from our mechanical engineers: if 10 bolts in 6.0 can do same job as 18 bolts in 7.3? I do not care about Duramax, but I do care about 6.0.

 

A good friend of mine with a F250 6.0/TS keeps blowing coolant when he's towing (stock truck). I started looking into this issue because I was curious what the problem might be expecting it to be an egr issue not a headbolt/gasket issue.

I frequent here and TDS to keep an eye on the truck pulling and dragracing competition because the best way to win is to know the competition.

I try to always stay on topic and discuss "Ford vs The Competition."

This forum needs a few guys that don't wear blue oval glasses discussing the competition side.

 

I guess I kind have to agree with that.

 

I'm going to ask this like I ask some many others that have made this claim and been unable to back up their statements.

What are these mass sever problems the D/A is having that far surpasses the 6.0 issues? Our was this a blind statement generated by favoritsm?

 

I think every make has problems no doubt about it. The argument will go on forever whos better and whos isnt. GMs duramax has surly been a lot better diesel engine then anything they have had in the past. But out of all the three the duramax has the least respect deserved or not. Mainly because of there bad reputation in the past. Nobody can deny that Ford has had the better diesel reputation over the longest period off time. GM probably the worst over the same period. One thing I think that GM has failed to adress there problems with there diesels off the past. For year after year they kept having the same problems over and over and never could improve. there relaibility. The diesel market was owned by Ford because off there dependability and GMs problematic diesels. Ford still has the diesel market cornered with a threat from the newer Duramax. The Duramax has had injector problems which again has hurt there reputation again. Now the 6.0 has definitly been the black eye for Ford in the first months of production. But hopefully all the bugs have been worked out. And through all this Ford has managed to keep there customers for these d diesels. If GM would have had similar problems. It would have been devistating to them. The blue oval reputation saved the day for Ford. Now Ill take my blue oval glasses off. Fire away bowtie fans.

 

Nothing to fire away at. Except 1 thing I'd like to correct. Ford 'has not' retained it's diesel share. It's dropped to 50 some % down from 90 something while the Dmax has risen to close to 40% up from 2%.


You couldn't have said it better 'If GM "WOULD HAVE HAD" problems it might have been devestating for them.'

 

I would really like to see these figures. I doubt very much that Ford ever had 90% of the market. This would mean that Dodge only had 8% of the diesel market and I find that hard to believe. In other words if Ford sell 200,000 Dodge only sold 16K. GM maybe only sold 4k but even that figure I doubt.

There is no doubt that the Duramax is the best diesel that GM has ever used but IMO its no better than the PSD and still not as good as the Dodge as far as reliabilty goes. The best thing about all this is compition breeds change for the better from all. I still don't buy a truck for the engine though. Nothing except a radical redesign would ever get me back in a GM product.