Hi, a new member here with a new to me truck and issue. Hoping you guys may be able to give me some advice before I start throwing parts at it.

Truck is a 2014 F250 XL with 6.2L gas engine. 25k miles. Was a very well taken care of plow truck. Now my daily driver. The used car dealer that had it replaced the Y pipe with cats due to a rotted exhaust flange. When I first looked at the truck, it was leaking but no check engine light, when I test drove it, it was fixed. Test drove it, ran great, no light and has been off for about a month. Its on now. The pending codes are P0420 and P0430 but don't set as a stored code.

I reset the computer and tightened the exhaust bolts and light was off for a week but came back this weekend.

My guess, is that they used a cheap part and now I'm paying for it. But why would it have set the code now and not then? Any suggestions?

BTW- I also have a 2003 F450 with the 7.3L / 6 speed combo. That truck never lets me down
Thanks,
Leo

 

Could possibly be a intermittent issue like corrosion or broken wires only making contact at random times. Is there much corrosion on those connectors?

 

When I tightened up the bolts I looked quickly and saw no issues with the wires, but I will take a closer look. I notice there are no heat shields. Would a shield help with these cats?

BTW - I have a very short trip to work. Any chance I could simply be over loading some sub-standards cats by not letting them heat up?

 

The factory cat does not have a heat shield other than some insulation when it runs by the cab. The catalyst efficiency monitor does require an inferred temp of 850 to 1200 before it runs a self test. But it only being inferred i could see an aftermarket cat not reaching this temp before the self test occurs.

 

I'm running a tank of that Guaranteed to Pass stuff and added one heat shield to the driver side cat. Cleared the codes on Tuesday night and went for a longer highway ride ~ 50 miles. Mil came back on last night. Checked live data and everything seemed to be in-range, but it did register a misfire some point at idle when not in gear. I'm guessing its recorded during start up, because it runs very good. I'm tempted to change the air filter and plugs and wires due to age (10 years old) but the truck only has 25K miles. Probably gonna do these as a peace of mind type of maintenance, but doubt it will change anything.

From what I've read here and my gut feeling, I think its the cheap aftermarket cats that were put on. Not sure what I'll do.

BTW- another observation. the truck was a plow truck but in very nice condition (old man truck). The underside was oiled and relatively clean. But the engine block is very rusty. Not surface rust, but big flaky chunks of rust where the oil cooler / oil filter mount is. I've never seen anything like that. Gonna clean it up some and Fluid Film everything.

 

If your able to get it, 44k by BG is really great for fuel system cleaner. It will burn your eyes coming out of the tail pipe and causes cancer in California so you know its actually doing something lol. As for the plugs, with it being used as a plow truck it probably has alot of hours running at low MPH. If its not been done now would be a good time.