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Originally posted by Sarge:
<<<< ford tech
the 7.3's are strong ass motors but they use a lot of older tech that's not too efficient making critical failures costly. the biggest thing I can stress with diesels, especially an older one like yours is to make sure you keep up on oil changes especially on top of other maintenance. a big problem the 6.0's had was people being idiots and not keeping proper intervals on their oil changes and that would start causing problems with the fuel injectors and other sub systems. it doesn't help that international didn't do a good job but I digress. KEEP ON THAT OIL!!!!

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6.0 problems didn't really start with oil maintence. 6 liter trucks plug the oil cooler on the coolant side then starve the egr cooler for coolant. Crack that then smoke. They also loose head gaskets when the boost is up too high. Cavitation the timing covers. The check ball in the low pressure pump comes out and goes through the low press pump. They loose high pressure oil pumps. Blow the branch tubes out of the oil pump. Loose ficim's. Sometimes loose injectors. Stick the turbo veins from too many short trips. And on and on. They keep me employed

 

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Posted by dohcfox (Member # 12829) on :
 
Do keep up on the oil changes on the 7.3 tho. When they go too long without service the oil breaks down and foams causing high press oil issues. Careful not to over tighten the cac hose clamps, they will tear the boots. Biggest thing on a 7.3 is it will prob need the air filter cleaned every 5k miles. They plug up easy for some reason and cause the turbo to draw vacuums on the suction side this causes he turbo to suck oil past the oil seal and put it through the cac. The tell tale sign is if the orange tubes going into the heads get oily and greasy looking. This is from the turbo pushing oil through the system. Ooh. And the diesels are very sensitive to dirty air. It takes only 1 tsp of dirt to dust a motor down. Then you will need a motor.
 

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Posted by Tom Renzo (Member # 13165) on :
 
It sounds like you guys are foreign to The 6.0 and 7.3. Reason being is that the 6.0 is a piece of crap plain and simple. From the pump seals to the electronics. And the 7.3 is naturist for lift pump failures and oil pans that rot off the engines. Other than that the 7.3 is not critical on oil change intervals other than factory recommendations. Cam sensor's and frequency valves are another issue on the E engines.The 7.3 is also known for leaks and most often they are related once again to the lift pump. CPR sensors are another issue with the 7.3 but the UP DATED part fixed that. But the 6.0 is the biggest piece of crap ever to come down the pike.
 

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Posted by Wildfire532FB (Member # 1482) on :
 
i've read of people running 20k on oil changes for their 7.3, they get their oil tested and the lab tells them they are safe to do that
 

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Posted by dohcfox (Member # 12829) on :
 
Depends on how the motor is used really. I've seen some turn into runaway diesels at 20k. 6.4 have a huge problem with all the fuel in the oil from the re gen process. Then cam and lifter problems begin. If you hear a rattle in a 6.4 it's probably got a valve terrain problem. Shit ty thing about it is that the cam is one of the first things to go into those motors
 

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