I have used fuel additives a few times and never saw any benefit from it so I have been using straight diesel fuel for years. 7.3 fuel systems aren't nearly as sensitive as the newer common rail injection systems are. If you get water, gasoline or any other contaminates in one of the new systems it can easily destroy the injection pump and injectors which is a very expensive repair. If you do that with a 7.3 the worst that happens is it quits running, and most of the time all you have to do is pump out the contaminated fuel, put fresh diesel fuel in, change the fuel filter and it will start right up and run fine.

 

As said above, 7.3s will run on just about anything, fuel additives won’t really benefit you. You’d get a lot more benefit from using a good oil additive, but even that is unnecessary as long as you change your oil regularly


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Yet ANOTHER reason that I'll keep my 7.3 till the cows come home. Thanks I too have used the additive with no noticeable change, but I did loose a HPFP a few years ago and did not want to go through that ordeal again. Another area on this site spoke of a guy with 6.7 having his pump go south and others spoke of additive, additive, additive.

 

Use a mix of low smoke 2stroke oil(to help Lubricate your injectors) and some diesel kleen to boost your cetane, the post you’ve been reading of the 6.7 HPFP failures you don’t have anything of that nature in your motor, your injectors are driven off of oil pressure not a HPFP but your injectors need good lubrication to stay working properly, 1oz of low smoke 2stroke oil to each gal. And some diesel kleen for cetane boost nd you will be chugging along for many miles!

 

IMHO,,, 2-Stroke is just silly (if you're going to go to the trouble of adding something, why not get All the benefits of a proper additive besides just lubricity)

A little dated, but still on point as to the reasons for using an additive (the 7.3 HEUI Injection System was Not designed to run ULSD with it's lowered lubricity).

http://rivrdog.typepad.com/files/copy-of-diesel-fuel-additive-version-3.pdf

 

Interesting reading at this link. I do like the lesser wear of the ball bearing of some of those additives. One question I had after reading that is why would anyone use "USED" engine oil? If anything I'd use fresh/clean diesel oil. No mention of that.

 

Every tank fill up I add Diesel Kleen, some say it's not necessary but with the low sulfer diesel a little added lubrication won't hurt.

 

I honestly wouldn’t bother putting anything in the fuel, but you can if it helps you sleep at night. I know you’re probably paranoid after your 6.7 hpfp failure, but the 7.3 is a completely different animal. I’ve never ever heard of the fuel side of a 7.3 injector failing. It’s always the oil side, and only because of oil change neglect. As said, a 7.3 will simply not run if there’s water or gasoline in the fuel tank, it won’t grenade any parts. Pretty much the only way the fuel side can fail is if your fuel pump is not supplying adequate fuel flow under a heavy throttle high egt situation




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I still run Diesel Kleen every couple of tanks. It seems to make the engine a bit quieter.

But....
I tried:
2-cycle oil for a time
Hot Shot Secret Extreme Diesel
Seafoam
Howe's
Archoil AR6200
In My Opinion, any difference made was minimal, if any.

I did try Archoil AR9100 Stiction Modifier (oil additive) for a couple oil intervals. It did seem to make the oil blacker at oil change. When I had the truck over to have one of my UVCHs changed the tech said the inside of the engine looks good. I do run Shell Rotella T6 5W40 all the time. It's synthetic. When I change the oil filter, the area the filter screws into is always clean too.

 

Just a thougt from another keyboard warrior.

In the past I never ever ran fuel treatments/additives because the one time I did (stp fuel injector cleaner on a 1991 Toyota pickup with the 22re) it ran like crap that whole tank and I just went back to regular gasoline. I also never ran synthetic oils my whole life until last year lol. I feel there is some benefit particularly on the 7.3l with a fuel treatment and either a synthetic blend/full syn oil but It wasn't for lubricity or making the truck last longer or anything lol.


Fuel treatment:
I am fairly ocd, not medical diagnosis but I keep a spiral notepad in each vehicle that tracks date/miles and work/maintenance. I also have one for the house/tractor etc. I noticed running diesel kleen in the winter gave me a .5-1mpg boost like 90% of the time. I didn't notice power/idle/anything else except a very small mpg boost only on the winter fuel. Figured that was nice but I didn't do the math to see if the cost of the fuel treatment was more or less than my normal fuel cost. Also truck sits for weeks at a time so the winter fuel treatment does very well in preventing gelling etc.

Synthetic oil:
I was scared as heck to put rotella t6 5w-40 full synthetic in a 20yr old diesel because I didn't know if it would start leaking bad or if I could switch back I didn't think anything terrible would happen but I was worried about leaks. WOW was I surprised in a good way. at -25 with delo 15w-40 conventional oil my truck would whine and groan for a few minutes and was noticeably harder starting. with the 5w-40 it started up and purred like it was a sunny 80 degree day lol... Only thing I didn't like was my truck burned it fast. like 4.5quarts in 4k miles.... No oil in fuel bowl, blue, black/whit smoke, just a 20yr old diesel burning a thinner oil faster is all. I did end up going with their new t6 15w-40 full synthetic and all though its better than the conventional still not as buttery smooth in the winter as the 5w-40.

Why did I write this?

Fuel treatments help with the diesels. I am not sure its needed for engine and system survival but it helped me in the winter only (no noticeable improvement in with summer blend that I can calculate this far). I know its helped with gelling too. I had summer diesel in some older trucks and needed that diesel kleen 911 to get it started after pulling a chunky filter out lol. I use diesel kleen a few times in winter and a few times in summer especially with road trips and unknown fuel stations but not every tank at all.

Synthetic blend/full synthetic: I think it was a huge benefit especially for cold and I mean below zero cold climates but other than that no fuel economy improvements, no leaks, just about 10-20% more cost wise but worth it to me.

Now that im done listening to myself talk/type, just wanted to share what I feel was some practical experience with both.

Assuming mpg, cost and everything stays the same: foe fuel treatment cost/savings:

I fill up 99% of the time when I need 20 gallons, so assum 20 gallons at $3.00 gets me 280miles at $60 a tank at 14.0mpg
now assume most common diesel kleen cost for me that's $2 per tank giving me a 90% .5mpg boost (winter only) same above prices at 14.5mpg

if I drive 12k miles per year my cost with diesel alone is: $2571.43 annualy, with diesel kleen cost me $2565.51. So in one year I MAY SAVE: $5.92 a year.... You could probably buy the biggest container and bring it down cost wise but I only noticed a fuel boost with winter blended fuel. so its really a close call for 90% of the user as to whether it saves money.

 

i use Amsoil all in one additive in my 2002 7.3 282,426 miles and my first injecter went cant complain about that.

 

I would complain about that. You can easily get that mileage out of injectors with regular oil changes and no additive. I’d expect 400-500k out of injectors if I was spending the money and going to the trouble of using a high end additive like that

I know I’ve said this a ton of times on this forum but my dad is at 300k right now on original injectors, he’s run waste oil and all kinds of crap through them and they still light right up well below freezing. He’s never used an additive other than anti gel when it’s extremely cold. Oil changes are the KEY


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I bought my 06 6.0 new. Put over 180,000 miles on it and dont use any additive.

 

Check out project farm on diesel fuel additives. I use hot shots due to its film strength no noticeable power but it has to be helping my fuel pump and injectors. I used to use howes but after watching that video I quickly changed and if you watch you see why.