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Overheating issue.. Sorta

3K views 21 replies 8 participants last post by  JoeyFish 
#1 ·
So I have a 2006 6.0 with 170,000 miles. Everything is stock other than the blue spring upgrade and the coolant bypass filter.
So for the past week or so I noticed sometimes when I start it up, white smoke will blow out the exhaust, and then whenever I'm accelerating from a stop black smoke will come out. I also had little power from a dead stop until I got into higher rpm's and then it would run fine. Everything else on it would work fine, it would idle for an hour without missing a beat. I had a check engine light for an EGR valve, so I took it out and cleaned it, and nothing changed other than the check engine light going away. Then for a few days none of the symptoms happened; no white smoke and no black smoke.
Then one day I started it up and noticed a lot more white smoke came out than usual, so I turned it off and checked the coolant reservoir. It had a lot of pressure in it from either the previous night, or from being started up for 10 seconds. I noticed the coolant was a bit low, so I added about half a gallon of water. My commute to work is about an hour drive, and on the way I noticed my air conditioning cut out, and then shortly after my coolant temp gauge (Stock gauge) started climbing. I also noticed a vacuum like sound that seemed to match my RPM's. I pulled over, let it cool down, and then bought some water from the gas station to add to the coolant. It took 3 gallons to fill back up. I drove for the remaining 10 minutes and parked it. 20 minutes later I got back in to head to the gas station and when I started it up a bunch of white smoke came out the exhaust and within 10 minutes of driving the temps started rising again. Pulled over, and it took another 3 gallons of water to fill back up. I ended up putting atleast 8 gallons of water in the thing by the time I got home. (about 100 miles of driving).
Is it normal for coolant temps to rise up without oil temps following? My oil temp gauge seemed to stay at the normal mark, if not lower. When I pop the hood to add water it doesn't feel or smell hotter than usual when my coolant temps are up. I also have no check engine light. It doesn't blow black smoke anymore, just white on start up and nothing at higher rpms. Sometimes it idles fine, sometimes I can feel it missing. Sometimes when trying to start it it will turn over, start to fire, and then just stop. Other times it starts up normal. Sometimes there's a lot of white smoke on start up, sometimes none at all. Sometimes I can hear a higher pitch whistle than normal, and sometimes I don't. The symptoms seem to come and go but the only one staying is the one where I'm loosing coolant. I don't see any leaks. My coolant cap is about 3 months old (I replaced it when I bought the truck because I heard they're prone to going bad) and it seems to hold pressure very well. From reading other forums it could be a head gasket issue, or an EGR issue?
I have plans for head studs, egr delete, etc.. down the road, I'm just trying to gather money to do it all at once.
 
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#2 ·
ld bet your egr coolr is ruptured and hopefully not yet but soon if you keep driving it your head gaskets
do you have a monitor? if not you are playing Russian roulette with your truck
 
#4 ·
Not yet, I've been looking into buying one soon I'm just trying to figure out which one I should go for. But now with all of these things happening, I'm debating on putting that money towards repairs.

How can an egr cooler make my coolant inter the engine? I'm not familiar with how it exactly works.
 
#3 ·
probably the egr cooler.
pull the valve again. inside the intakes plenum, where you removed the valve, there are 2 tiers. inspect the upper tier for wetness. if it's wet, the cooler is likely leaking.
or if you pull the valve and it's shiny and new looking, it's probably steam cleaned from coolant
 
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#6 ·
If my EGR cooler is blown, is there a temporary way to bypass it? I won't have time till after tomorrow to really work on it, and I need to get to work.
Would one more day of stopping and adding water to the coolant system every time it got warm bother it too much?
 
#10 ·
Put some freeze plugs in both ends of the cooler but that will require removing it.

To understand how coolant gets in you need to understand how an EGR cooler works. An EGR cooler cools the exhaust and puts it back into the engine (thank the tree huggers) when coolant doesn't flow through the EGR fast enough (usually a clogged oil cooler is the problem) it boils inside and the pressure causes cracks to form in the cooler allowing exhaust to enter the coolant system and coolant into the engine.

As others have said don't drive it unless you want to increase the chance of blowing a head gaskets

You said that the coolant gauge went to the red and oil stayed the same what are you using to see oil temp? There isn't and oil temperature gauge just dummy oil pressure, dummy transmission temp, dummy coolant temp, fuel, speedo, and RPMs

Also black smoke is too much fuel to air ratio are you tuned? If not look for a boost/exhaust leak.
 
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#8 ·
here is a good write up on 6.0 ownership
http://www.powerstroke.org/forum/6-...s-consider-about-owning-6-0l.html#post2147484

also check out the stickies in the 6.0 section monitoring a 6.0, and bulletproofing a 6.0

and remember the dash gauges are only for decoration. they wont tell you anything until it is too late.
also if you can get a ride take another car etc i would.
as kaya pointed out the heads don't need any extra encouragement to warp, crack, stretch the tty bolts etc.
good luck
 
#9 ·
Many of us have been there, buddy. I'm hoping that you were able to catch it early enough that it saved your head gaskets. :thumb:
 
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#11 ·
#12 ·
let us know how this turns out :thumb:
 
#16 ·
Alright, so I have it taken apart, and I removed the EGR cooler pipe. It looks clean, and I don't see any damage or anything. There is signs of water in the exhaust pipe that connects to it. I'll see if I can post some pictures sometime in the next week because its too dark now, and I'm leaving out of town for a few days.

I sent a picture to one of my friends who owns a 6.0 performance shop (he's really busy so I didn't want to bother him with my problems unless I have to, plus hes far away) and he said I could have tested the EGR cooler without taking anything apart by backing it up on a really steep incline, and removing the egr valve to see if any water is draining into the intake.
I wish I would have known that before I took the whole thing apart, haha.

Anything I should look for since I'm partway into the engine? Anything I should look for in particular in the EGR cooler pipe? I cant see anything obvious, but then again I don't know exactly what to look for.
 
#17 · (Edited)
yea someone really should have mentioned that you could pull the valve and check for signs of coolant in the intake..oh wait! i did! yup. post 3.

regardless, if you've got coolant in the egr transfer pipe, it's leaking. but, if you really don't believe it, just throw it in the bathtub and pressurize the coolant port with other end plugged. watch for bubbles out the exhaust feed/exit. you'll have some nice little hot tub jets goin on :)
 
#18 ·
It was moistish looking, but I was expecting to see more water! Looking back I should have retained everything better and paid closer attention though.. my bad :doh:
I'm just going to throw on an EGR delete kit because I don't want any chance of it being an issue again in the future. I'll still do that test though to see if the EGR actually is the problem or not just for fun, haha.
Thanks again for your help! I really hope my issue is resolved once I throw everything back together otherwise I might cry.
 
#20 ·
HOLD UP!!

before you replace it all you should consider this too....


150% sure your oil cooler is clogged, which causes coolant to not pass through your egr cooler which ruptures it... but you need to address the cause. The ford gold coolant gels up under the heat and pressure causing your oil cooler to clog, causing your egr cooler to rupture and sometimes causing a head gasket failure.... flush your coolant system first ALOT ALOT ALOT before replacing your oil/egr cooler that way your new components wont clog.

a lot of people myself included use caterpillar elc (extended life coolant) you can buy the rotella brand from tractor supply co, or pay $25+ a gallon from a cat or international dealer...

grab 5 gallons so you have one extra after the flush.


I have had three 6.0's and learned a thing of to to help others ;).
 
#21 ·
I'll make sure I'll flush the system before I install it! The part wont be here for another 4 days :( so I'll have some time to clean things up and such. Unless I just get impatient and weld the cooler shut and just install the part later down the road when I do head studs or something. I've put many gallons of distilled water through it while it was drinking it, so it's probably mostly flushed anyway, but I'll do it!
 
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