Just about a year ago my 1988 Superduty long chassis dually suffered a catastrophic engine failure. After some discussion on this forum and a lot of research on my part I decided to go with a replacement engine from my local International dealer. The engine was rebuilt by Franlikn. Franklin used to be owned by Delco/Remy but they were sold in January to Cat. I had promised back in May of last year to give an update on how this engine fared long term. A year out and about 8,000 miles later it looks as if the engine is getting replaced.

Since the first day I drove the truck with the new engine I've had an annoying problem. Trail the throttle above about 2,000 rpms and the engine surges. That turned out to be the injector pump. In the process of getting that sorted out the dealer finally heard the top end ticking noise that I'd noticed at about a week out. It is looking like a wrist pin problem and there is metal in the oil filter. It is a warranty but it's annoying. What's so sad is this engine just got nicely broken in. It doesn't use oil at all. The fuel economy finally got to what i'd expect and it runs really strong. I've got 25 psi oil pressure at idle hot and 40-45 all the time off idle. Could be worse. No rods through the sides of blocks etc but it would be nice to have gotten it right the first time. I'm not looking forward to 9 mpg and changing the oil all the time again.

 

Good luck with the 7.3.

My mileages were 2700, 9700 and 17,000 miles.
They shipped me a fourth engine, but I refused to install it since the warranty was close to running out.
Also I tore it down before I unbolted it from the shipping pallet, the sleeves were dropping before it was ever fired the first time.

All my problems were dropping sleeves that cracked the blocks.

After three I went to a rebuilt 6.9 turbo without sleeves that I did myself, it is closing in on 18,000 miles and still running STRONG.

After the three Reviva engines, I did look at International and the Franklin engine.
Now I am even happier I rebuilt my own 6.9.

 

While hunting down a 6.9 and getting it built right is tempting I can't afford the down time. I also can't afford the money. If I was starting at zero and it was April of 06 I'd buy the 1991 Superduty flat bed I was offered for 5k and just stick my utility box on it. It would have been a lot cheaper. I found the 1991 2 days after I'd ordered the engine. Oh well. Who knows it could have blown up 6 months after I bought it. My problem with the replacement engine is I only have 12 months to run up the miles on it now. I was lucky to have gottne to the 8 k I had on the first one. I kind of blew it because the first engine had that tick from the get go and I just wasn't in the mood to wrestle with International about getting it diagnosed and they were denying it was there in the first go round. How it got acknowledged is I finally got it back in to get the injector pump solved and the mechanic on the test drive said what's that top end noise?

All I can say is I'm happy for you Dave. May you get the additional 482,000 miles that block ought to have in it. You are certainly due for some extra good luck this time around. As for me I did do one thing right. I bought the LUK clutch. Well that and I didn't buy a Reviva. Decent oil pressure has been fun to have. That and not burning oil between oil changes. Franklin claims the wrist pin knock is unusual.

You may recall I also had to buy a transmission. I got a Ford rebuild out of OK from Sanderson Ford. It's the later model ZF. Other than my wiring harness not matching up I have no complaints. It's kind of fun to be able to get down into first while the truck is still rolling. I do wish I had some more gear on top and if I ever recover from buying an engine, transmission and clutch all in one fell swoop I'm going to look at an overdrive for this thing.

1988 F Superduty 7.3 idi long chassis 5 spd