Always hard start, tries when crank but then not again until key is cycled.

[adfields]

01 EX 7.3

This drove me nuts, it would try as soon as I started cranking (tack jumps to 500 then falls back to 300) then not start or even try no matter how long I crank. Turn the key off and hit it again and it does the very same thing. Then after 6 to 10 times of this with blue smoke coming out the hood and exhaust it finely starts but with a small miss and blue smoke that eventually cleans up.

Did all the usual stuff, glow plugs, CPS, yada yada but that wasn’t it. I was sure with the smoke and much research it was injector O-ring and put an entire set of injectors in . . . same dang thing! At this point everything is new or well checked out and much money wasted when the wife says “what about the fuel filter?” I was shocked she even knew it had one but I guess in the 23 years of living with me she wasn’t always ignoring me. I had changed the filter less than 500 miles before this started and it wasn’t acting like a plugged filter so I had assumed it was fine, but what do I got to loose at this point.

Drained the filter bole into an empty water bottle to start the filter change and there was over 2 cups of water in there . . . yes over 2 cups! I don’t know why but it got a slug of water someplace somehow in the last 500 miles or so. The filter was all water soaked and in went a new one, $32 worth and you don‘t want to know the injector price. Turn on key to prime with the electric pump then try to start, does the same thing but starts on 3rd try this time, smokes, runs rough then all cleans up. Kill it and restart, fires right up first try but smokes a bit. I let it run half an hour then restarted and no more smoke, no miss, runs great, starts better than ever thanks to new everything.

So anyway guys the problem (smoking, missing, and all) is water in the fuel bole and the fix is a simple fuel filter change even if you just changed it