Hey guys I have a new problem to me and it has been getting worse and more often.

First let me say that I just changed both fuel and oil/oil filters on the truck. However these were an attempt at possibly fixing a basic problem. It did nothing but make it worse!

When I start the truck cold it goes through the normal fuel pump, injector on/off flickers and possibly even the vacuum pump light goes out then start. Everything starts up and runs. We go about our way, then shut down the truck because we are at our destination. Shop for 5-30 minutes then come out and re-start the truck.

Now the fun begins...Stumbling almost like a V-8 running on 4. Truck is trying to die but puts up with it. You can hear the stumbles as it hits the engine. Black smoke will billow out. Press the accellerator and try to get the rpms up and it may go away. Other times not.

What I noticed is that when the injectors do there little noise on/off clicking for what 3 seconds it runs fine. When I re-start the truck, the noise does not sound as strong, almost like whatever drives them is not working. Then the stumbling start confirms it.

Let me know what you guys think. It has 37k on an 03 with a new long block in 04. This truck has one of the longest laundry lists known to Ford. However it has been trouble free for at least two years. Now this.

What do ya think FICM, HPOP, ???

 

Anyone have any ideas?

 

not unless it's sucking air from some ware sounds like something is getting warm and warping causing an air leak maybe around fuel fillters

 

I believe that you didn't get an answer, because that's one weird issue, and I believe that I've never come across anything like that since I'm here on FTE.
Anyways, black smoke would be fuel related issue in my belief, but I say it really carefully.
It is not HPOP, but it could be FICM. Since you mentioned it runs fine when you start at first, maybe you want to drive it somewhere where you can read codes, and shut off for that 5-30 minutes, and check if you have any DTC-s.

 

Sounds like egr valve is sticking open, the fact that it goes away sometimes when you open it means the valve may be clearing the blockage and then closing. Has to be some codes related, we could be more helpful if you run down to autozone and have them pull the codes for you. Could also be a FICM starting to go out. Even though you had a long block, egr valve,ficm,intake,etc had to be transferred over from original motor. Again, if its acting up that bad it should have codes.

 

Interesting you bring up the codes. For several weeks this did not throw codes. It was one of those Well I will just drive it untill it gets a little worse or an engine light comes on.

Then after I changed the oil the problems got ten times worse. Almost wouldn't run. Finally the engine light pops up. I grabbed the SCT tuner that was given to me(always wanted to but never did dump any tunes because of the long block issue). However it does read codes right... Well I hooh it up and this time it says it cannot read the codes??? I do not remember the wording but it was to the effect of cannot read or cannot get the codes. I never had this happen before.

I was leaning toward the FICM because of the inconsistant noise from the injectors at times. Every time the injectors sounds weird, I go to turn the key and start and low and behold it wants to die.

 

Truck goes in Monday. I'll keep ya posted...

 

that sounds like an egr problem did you try unplugging theegr valve to see if it goes away

 

Well I have had the truck back for a while. It is running great. The dealer pulled the FICM. Installed a new one and drove the truck. Problem was instantly gone. He called me and explained it would be $1600 to replace. I was less than thrilled to say the least. I paid my $250 deductible for that and Geico extended warranty picked up the remaining amount. I finally got my $16/per month back for the 7 years extended warranty

Truck is driving awesome and has the new flash to warm up the ?spools? on the injectors? Anyway its working well.