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Leaving on cross-country trip next Sat.... HELP!!!

803 views 5 replies 3 participants last post by  Dante04SRT 
#1 ·
As the weather has gotten colder, my 6.0 F350 is getting hard to start. Well, actually it always starts ok, but it runs like garbage for about 5-10 minutes until it warms up a bit. If I even attempt to touch the pedal before then and drive it, it bucks, surges and shakes, badly. After it warms up, the performance seems fine and it doesn't have any issues again until the engine cools down overnight.

To add, I'm running Vivian's Looney Tune, but the engine is essentially stock (w/blue spring) and I'm religious about fluid and filter maintenance.

We're planning on making a 4,000 mile round trip journey to see family over Thanksgiving and I'm getting nervous that something serious may be wrong with the injection. Yesterday morning (forgot to plug the truck in), the truck started the hardest it'd ever started. Air temp was around 32-35*F. I dropped the truck off at the dealer for diagnosis of the problem and they tested it this morning with the engine cold. Before taking it in, I flashed back to stock.

They called this morning and said the FICM was bad and it was only outputting 27V+ instead of the 48 it should be. The stated this was the reason for my cold start issues. I immediately called Swamps and ordered a 58V FICM and will be picking it up from them tomorrow. Upon picking the truck up this afternoon, the dealer notified me (after paying my insane $150 diagnostic fee) that they couldn't really test for injector issues because the FICM is the first test point and since it tested bad, they didn't have an base line for injector performance... Make sense??

I drove the truck home (on stock tune) and the performance was seriously lacking. It literally felt like the truck was either missing an injector or they were all performing sub-par equally. It wasn't the fact that I was used to the tune, I could just tell something was NOT right.

I'm running out of time to fix this thing before my trip. We'll be leaving next Saturday 11/17... Fingers crossed, I'm hoping the FICM will fix the overall issue and I don't need any injectors. This is the first time I've had any starting/running issues. Before the cold weather, everything seemed pretty much alright. Has anyone had this same symptom pattern before? Was the FICM the fix-all for the problem or did you still need injectors? If the FICM doesn't at least bring my stock performance back to par, am I justified to take it back to the dealer and insist on a fee-free diagnostics, considering they didn't do the contribution test on the injectors today??

Any advice would be GREAT! The past 36 hours have been a living hell, full of worry... Do I take the truck or bite the bullet and fly the family? I'd really love to take the truck and make a road trip out of it, but I'm just running out of time to get things sorted.

HELP!

-Brian
 
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#2 ·
i think you may have a combination of ficm problems and injector stiction.
have you load tested your batteries seperately? one dead or WEAK battery can kill your ficm. you must disconnect the cables to one battery to test them so it doesnt pull off the good one.
stiction happens when the temps turn colder, the piston in the injector sticks and hangs up causing a misfire untill the oil warms up, freeing the injector. there is a reflash from ford to make the injectors "buzz" (cycle electrically ) while the glowplugs are on to help free up the injector. if its plugged in, there should be no stiction, as the engine will be warm enought to prevent it.
 
#3 ·
Batteries are good, recently replaced. I'm in the process right now of taking the FICM out to bring it to Swamps and pick up my new unit.

-Brian
 
#4 ·
I drove to Swamps Diesel yesterday and picked up my 58V FICM. First, I'll say those guys really know what they are doing. I was very impressed by their operation and will definitely trust my future purchases to them...

Anyway, I got home, installed the new FICM, changed the oil, air filter, fuel filters. I added some Rev-X as well. The truck seems to run fine now.

I did a cold start on it this morning - it was 38*F out (not plugged in, either). Truck fired right up and didn't seem to have any issues. At some point, I'll be replacing the injectors as preventative, but they seem to be ok for now.
 
#6 ·
I installed the FICM first and then drove it around - The truck didn't seem to be missing like it did before.

Only after I confirmed the FICM was working properly did I do the other... I'm just glad it's working properly.
 
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