Any Ideas? F350 Will Not Start.

[joebob72209]

Well I recently purchased a Ford F350 With the 7.3 powerstroke. When i purchased the truck it ran fine but lacked power. I Drove it home and let it sit for a week or so. Now the truck will not start. The Truck does crank but will not start.

I did notice:
- Durring Cranking the truck white smokes alot and is also smoking out of the intake through the air filter.

-There is some oil in the intake but i figure this is comming from the ccv.

-None of the fuses are blown.

-The glow plug power relay is putting power to the glow plugs but i am unsure how to test the individual glow plugs. I figure this might not be the issue because the truck will not start even with the block heater plugged in and the block heater is heating up the block.

-The HPOP Reservoir is full of oil.

-I Changed the Fuel Filter thinking this may be the problem but no change and the fuel in the filter bowl looked good.

-I Know the fuel is good cause i personally filled it up from almost empty when i bought it.

-I did purchase a Fuel Pressure Tester To test pressure but i will not be able to hook this up until tomorrow when i get an adapter to hook to the schrader valve.

... Also everyone should know that this is my first diesel and i have never worked on one before. Any ideas as far as things to check or suggestions would be appreciated.

oh yea and also when i bought the truck i would have to rev the motor when i started it so that it would not die out but after a couple seconds it would idle fine.

[Fireman40]

Im going to suggest possibly your HPOP has gone bad. HIGH PRESSURE OIL PUMP. These trucks take a lot of oil pressure to fire the injectors off. Bad pump=no injector pressure=no start. Im probalbly wrong but maybe it will help you

[HaysKSFirefighter]

Originally Posted by Fireman40

Im going to suggest possibly your HPOP has gone bad. HIGH PRESSURE OIL PUMP. These trucks take a lot of oil pressure to fire the injectors off. Bad pump=no injector pressure=no start. Im probalbly wrong but maybe it will help you

White smoke on cranking means he's getting at least 500psi icp or else the idm wouldn't even be firing the injectors. Check the fuel pressure and post it up.

[Turbostang500]

White smoke means it is getting fuel but not burning it right?
maybe the cps?
he said it was down on power also and wont idle unless he revs it for a little bit.
Do you think it would be timing related? That was my thinking on the cps (cam position sensor).

I can see fuel pressure also.

[HaysKSFirefighter]

Originally Posted by Turbostang500

White smoke means it is getting fuel but not burning it right?
maybe the cps?
he said it was down on power also and wont idle unless he revs it for a little bit.
Do you think it would be timing related? That was my thinking on the cps (cam position sensor).

I can see fuel pressure also.

Correct...Cps is possible. OP-does your tachometer move when you are turning the motor over? If it registers, than you have a cps signal. Do you have any way to check for trouble codes?

[Patrick Feeley]

Check the voltage drop across the Glowplug relay. Place the DVOM leads on the big relay terminals and read what the voltage drop is when the relay is active (up to about 1.5 to 2 minutes after the key is turned to Wait-to-Start). A reading of more than 0.3V and the relay is toast (remember you are reading the drop across the relay, so the bigger the number, the bigger the voltage drop).

To check the glowplugs: There are 4 connectors going into the valvecover gaskets on the engine. Two on each side. Each connector has 5 pins. The middle on each connector 3 are for the injectors, the outer 2 are for one glowplug each. Measure the resistance from each glowplg pin to ground. It should be in the 0.1 to 2 ohm range. Going the opposite direction (from the harness side connector pins back to the GPR) you should get no more than 0 to 1 ohm.

Cheers!

[atvrider93]

in the meantime to check fuel pressure you can open the schrader valve while cranking and if you get a good spray you should have sufficient pressure.

[joebob72209]

Well Today i could not find an adapter for the fuel press. gauge that i have but i did manage to find a makeshift one out of a 12 in grease gun flex hose. When i had my girlfriend crank the motor with me watching the gauge there is absolutely no fuel pressure and i also noticed a loud clunking sound during cranking that i wasnt able to notice while i was sitting in the truck by myself. Also the rpm gauge does move while cranking. Does anyone know what the fuel pressure should be while cranking? i purchased both a haynes manual (no diesel info) and a chiltons manual and neither one of these are giving me any info.

[joebob72209]

Originally Posted by joebob72209

Well Today i could not find an adapter for the fuel press. gauge that i have but i did manage to find a makeshift one out of a 12 in grease gun flex hose. When i had my girlfriend crank the motor with me watching the gauge there is absolutely no fuel pressure and i also noticed a loud clunking sound during cranking that i wasnt able to notice while i was sitting in the truck by myself. Also the rpm gauge does move while cranking. Does anyone know what the fuel pressure should be while cranking? i purchased both a haynes manual (no diesel info) and a chiltons manual and neither one of these are giving me any info.

My Mistake i had a leak in my makeshift fuel pressure gauge setup. i cranked it again after fixing the leaky setup and the fuel pressure slowly climbed to around 35 psi or so but it is still making that loud clunking sound.

[joebob72209]

This is what i am thinking and i wanna see if anyone else is thinking the same thing as i am.... Maybe this loud clunking sound is mechanical failure of some sort in the valve train. The reason i am thinking this is:

-Engine Wont Start.
-Engine Does Crank.
-There Is a Loud Clunking Sound Coming From Somewhere on the engine.
-The truck is getting atleast 35 psi of fuel at the schrader valve.
(might get higher if i crank longer)
-There is alot of white smoke coming from the exhaust.
-There is smoke coming out of the air filter.

What Do you guys think?