Hello people out there,

I will just blah my problem into this forum and see what kind of ideas we can drum up. I have read about 150 posts trying to find my exact problem and what the solution was to no avail.

2000 F350 7.3 DRW manual
180,600 miles
Between 165k and 175k I had the valve cover gaskets done, 8 rebuilt injectors, rebuilt turbo done

I bought the truck with 165ish on it 5ish years ago from a probate sale. It had sat for a year prior to me buying it after the owner died. I obviously don't drive it very often either and mostly make a couple dump runs a year and pull a trailer once or twice to Oregon and back.

For the 4th we drug a small trailer to Oregon and back with no issues. After getting home I then drug the trailer to my parents where I keep it and omw home the truck had some sort of malfunction. It sounded funny, ran rough and had very little power. I towed the truck home and started trying to diagnose the problem.

The truck starts fine and seems to run on all eight cylinders each time. Within 1 to 5 seconds the truck seems to shut off the passenger bank and the truck starts to run like crap. I read a lot about the UVCH problems and thought I had figured it out. I pulled the valve cover off the passenger side and it looked connected and in good condition. I unhooked it and reseated it and I get no change. With the truck running I can unplug the passenger harness and the truck sounds no different (still running like crap). If I unhook the driver's side, the truck dies.

So I read about some issues where the truck shuts off a bank of cylinders and saw it may be IDM related. They are pretty expensive to get and i didn't want to just throw parts at it.

I checked resistance at the IDM harness on all eight injectors. I get 3 ohms on all of them except injector five where I get 2.5 ohms. It isn't much different but it is slightly lower.

I checked resistance at the UVCH and I don't see any issues and the resistance is within spec. If there is a difference with injector five I don't see it here.

I checked every bit of the harness I could find and didn't see any worn wires or burnt pins.

I have the IDM in my hand now and I am trying to determine whether I should send it off to be checked or order up something that can buzz test (not sure if that would help diagnose). I only have a cheap code reader so all I can see is a P1316.

When I get home I plan on unhooking the injector for #5 to see what the truck does down that injector but I am looking for any other ideas while I am sitting here at my desk where I should be working =) ... Any other ideas or questions? Most of the posts I read about the truck running without a bank didn't mention the truck running fine for 1-5 seconds first. Its like the truck is actively deciding to do it but I can't figure out why since the resistances don't seem completely out of the norm.

 

I pulled the plug off of injector 5 and the engine runs like it’s missing but doesn’t kill the bank. I also did injector 3 and it still ran like it was missing and didn’t kill the bank. I’m leaning towards ordering the stuff to do a cylinder contribution test and a Buzz test ….

 

Welcome to FTE, hopefully some help will arrive, you had the valve covers done... since you pulled the conx and it stayed running the same, I would investigate that further first, the 7.3's are solid, with a reputation for that, IME, it's something electrical not checking in/working right... on my 02 F350 it acted up when i first got it, pulled the conx, put some no-ox on them, has been fine since, my 02 Ex had the IPR take a crap, took it apart, cleaned it and ordered a new one, all good, have done that on 3 or 4 friends trucks. When the 7.3's fail, again, IME, it's something not communicating correctly/electrically, hard to diag over the interweb, was it running good before gasket change..? I would lean towards that.

 

The gasket change was 3-4 years ago but only like 7-10k miles. The passenger gasket I’m down to looks good and the resistance seems correct across all 4 passénger injectors when connected. I ordered a WI-FI/OBD connector so I should be able to buzz test in a couple days.

the part that’s confusing me that seems different to a lot of peoples trucks running without a bank of cylinders is that my truck starts fine each time and then decides to shut the passenger side down. somewhere in that behavior will be the answer to the problem.

I had read one guys post that was kinda similar and he was taking solenoids off of injectors and moving them around and I believe diagnosed a bad solenoid that way. I’m gonna order some of the no-ox and just throw it in all the connections anyways cause it sounds like it can’t hurt.

 

I'm just gonna keep posting stuff in the hopes someone has experienced these problems and can help out with a solution

I got my OBD thing and downloaded ForScan.

When it scanned the PCM it pulled a ton of codes. I don't know if they are recent or old and I didn't know how to clear them and run it again but I will be doing that today since I figured out how to do it. The codes it pulled were:
P1280, P1000, P0603, P1316, P1211, P0671, P0673, P0675, P0677

I ran the buzz test and got these codes:
P0273, P1273, P1274, P1275, P1293

Today I am going to clear the codes, start the truck and run the cylinder contribution test and change the oil. The oil level seems ok but I haven't changed it in 2-3 years since I don't drive it that much. I've been told oil can make the truck do all kinds of weird stuff. Will keep the updates coming =)

 

OK, An update ... although it feels like I am talking to myself =)

I cleared the codes and ran the buzz test again. It popped with P0273 and P1275.

I then pulled injector 5 and swapped it with Injector 3. Buzz test again and it changed to P0267 and P1273.

To me it sounds like the problem is following the injector which makes me think its the problem. I'm gonna try and do the solenoid first to see if that solves it and then throw a reman injector in if that doesn't work.

 

You can shim the solenoid instead of replacing it...especially at the mileage you're at. When you do the buzz test, is your tachometer moving in conjunction...