98 E450 7.3 Smokes No Power On Acceleration

[EdLennon]

I need some help!

I have a 1998 Ford E450 Super Duty Box Van with a 7.3 PowerStroke Diesel.

I use it as our family's toy hauler. Last weekend I was headed to the
motocross races and I was about 1 mile from the track and made a right turn
at fairly slow speed. Once I got back on the throttle, the truck was just
pouring black smoke out of the exhaust and had no power at all.

I immediately pulled over, checked the vital fluids and everything appeared
to be normal. I got back in, started it up and began to proceed back down the road. It idled just fine, but no power above idle and black smoke pouring out of the exhaust.

I made it to the track and a buddy of mine saw the smokescreen coming towards him and wanted to know what was going on. I told him the story and he was thinking it was intake side of the turbo the boot came loose or off and the turbo was not making any power. We popped the hood and nothing was loose.

We started the truck up and on the exhaust side of the turbo, the pipe that
comes from the right side cylinder head into the right side of the exhaust intake "Y" (coming into the turbo) was pouring out the black smoke.

I made some calls to the local Ford dealers and was told that I could replace the donut gasket between the pipe and the "Y". I started removing the bolts
so that I could get the pipe disconnected from the "Y" and you guessed it,
the 2nd bolt broke off cleanly in the "Y".

I gave up since I was not at home and did not have all my tools. Since I was
unable to get everything off completely, I rotated the existing donut gasket
180 degrees and I just bolted the connection back together with 1 bolt.

Where the other bolt was, I just used a huge pair of vice grips clamped down real tight. I figured that would not work, but the believe it or not, the truck
ran just fine. I drove it back home and had no problems what-so-ever.

So I am curious: Is that exhaust gasket/donut my real problem or do I have a deeper problem that I may not be seeing? I've heard that I may have a fuel related problem (fuel filter needs replacing), but I don't know if that would have caused all that black smoke to pour out just that one side of the exhaust just prior to the turbo.

If you guys have ANY advice, it would be greatly appreciated. I don't know
much about these motors, but I am learing a great deal by reading on this forum.

Thanks,
Ed

[jessemac]

Is your air filter clean?

[EdLennon]

Clean, almost new.