A mechanics opinion of P.S.D.

[Doc Tinker]

I haven't worked on the PSD in the Ford pickups, but I'm sure they are a pain. As an engine, they are pretty good and quite reliable. The school bus version holds up quite well, even when used in the 65 passenger busses.



Back in the 80s, the company I worked for had a bunch of Ford vans with the early V8 International engines. We had to replace all of the oil coolers, under warranty, because of leakage. Other than that, I have not seen too many problems with the engine series.



Doc

 

[Lil' Dog]

Evan,



You just hope that the part that breaks off the glow plug is big enough not to go through the firing hole, then you just have to break your knuckles getting the injectors out and go fishing. . LOL... IDI is good for that anyway, well at least for $$$.



J-eh

 

[Pit Bull]

Reading what you Mechanic's have to say about diesels is interesting. I am sure that my Cummins will last as long as I want to drive it. I have a friend of mine that has an old 199? PSD with 270K miles on it, and still rolling. The body is beatup and the windows no longer roll down. He gets 90K miles of service out of his "E" rated tires and he is a construction guy that uses the H*ll out of his truck ( a lot of these miles were put on pulling a 5th wheeler. He changes the oil every 10K - 12K miles and when something breaks he gets the wrench out and fixes it. He is not a car guy and does not know much about fixing trucks but he can't seem to kill this diesel truck. To illustrate how he is not a car guy, back in 1970 he bought a new 1970 396 Chevelle SS and when I got out of the Marine Corp in 1971 I come over to see him. We were talking about his car (I am a car guy) and I was telling him what he could do to it to make it faster. Well in the conversation it came out that he had never changed the oil in his car (it had 18K miles on it at the time) I was shocked (he thought you just needed to add oil when it got low) So we got oil and filter to change it. When I took out the oil plug, the oil just came out in clumps . I told him to trade it in now and when he got a new one to read the owners manual and follow the maintence instructions. If my buddy can get 270K plus out of a PSD, the way I maintain my Cummins it should last 1,000,000 miles. I am sure that you guys that are in the business of working on trucks have better stories then this but it is amazing to me what people do to their vehicles and then wonder why they have a problem

 

[Evan A. Beck]

Doc, the old 6. 9/7. 3L engine series was excellent, much better than the PSD in my opinion. They could really take a beating. The PSD seems to be much more fragile.



J-eh, I have had to fish a couple of tips out that way, but it can be very tricky! I recall one in particular where a tip broke off, and made its way down into the cylinder... We called the guy and told him the situation, and what his options were... Since he was short on $$$, he said to just let it go. So that's what we did... When we started the rig, it made a horrid knock. So we wound it up to 3000 RPM, and the knock got more and more quiet as the tip of the glowplug got hammered into the top of the piston. Truck runs great, still comes in for oil changes from time to time. Go figure.

 

[Johnboy3]

Fragile?

Evan, feed an old IDI 7. 3 30 psi of boost and see which one is fragile. LOL

 

[Evan A. Beck]

Can't really compare it there, Johnboy... The 7. 3IDI is not designed for 30 psi of boost. . Give it 30 psi, and the thing will blow up. Cylinder pressures will go waaaay too high, because the CR is like 21. 5:1. They can handle about 11-12 psi, but anything more than that, is just asking for trouble.



Heat is the biggest killer for the 6. 9/7. 3. Seen lots of cracked pistons because of excess heat.



The PSD is plagued with problems, I see it on a daily basis. Intake rails, injector o-rings, donut gaskets, exhaust manifolds, clogged FP regulators, and worst of all the UVC harnesses. You'll never see an old IDI fail because of any of these things...



However, all of those problems are preventable. Too bad Ford doesn't know it.

 

[Johnboy3]

I know, I was just playing.



What goes wrong with the intake rails and exhaust manifold?



The fuel regulator screens should be cleaned with a filter change anyhow. I don't call that a failure.

 

[Evan A. Beck]

Well, the intake rails on the PSD are sealed to the heads using silicone. This in itself is not a bad thing, but when it is combined with the hot, oily mist from the crankcase blowby, the silicone begins to break down. Lots of oil residue is a good indication that they are leaking, robbing you of some performance. I have pulled the intake rails off at 100K+ miles, and the silicone is still tacky--it never had a chance to cure. The remedy for leaking rails is to re-seal them, and they re-route the crankcase breather OUTSIDE of the turbo inlet. Just dump it onto the ground like on a Cummins.



Exhaust manifolds, donut gaskets. and the Y-pipe are also theives of performace. I see a lot of them with broken manifold bolts, and then a leak develops. THe manifold heats up, and then shrinks during cooldown, causing stress on the bolts. Exhaust leaks out, causing a drop in turbo drive pressure/volume, which means lowered perfromance due to lack of boost. Same goes for the donut gaskets between the manifolds and the Y-pipe. They leak and rob performance too. About half the time the Y-pipe has to be replaced dues to cracking at the turbo flange. I have found that using high-temp RTV on the dount gaskets wards off leaks, and makes them last much longer.



Sometimes, the pipes between the manifolds and Y-pipe are not installed properly from the factory. I have seen the ends of them all dented up and leaking severely. This is pretty common on the 96-97 PSD's. So check yours out for black soot marks on the gaskets, and check out the manifolds for broken bolts abd leaks.



A lot of fellas don't know about cleaning the FP regulator screen. It's amazing what gets caught in there. The 99+ PSD's use a different FP regulator, and they rarely clog up because the return fuel is filtered--on 94-97's the return fuel was not filtered.



Fuel hoses are also a problem with the 94-97 PSD's. The ends on them crack, and leak. Air can get in when the truck is not running, causing hard starting. Similar to the fuel hose problem on the 94-96 Cummins.

 

[R.E. Miller]

I won't knock on the PSD...but

Well, I put a 4" exhaust on one with the new down pipe, and well... . as stated before that stinks on the 1994-1997 trucks.



Big Toy,



Funny construction truck story (if you don't own the truck ) A local landscape company bought a new ford 600-something series truck with a big gas engine for use with a hydro-seeder. Their workers had trouble with it and went under the hood. Some how the air cleaner wingnut ended-up in the intake mainfold, and oops, no one thought to get it out They didn't know they ordered their truck with the ultra-short service life engine package



Russell

 

[FFutch]

Sorry I've been away so long. I was doing a little side work and Christmas stuff and all. The side work was on a Pete conventional. These are some of the easiest trucks in the world to work on. I did rods and mains and 3 barrel and plungers in about 6 hours. Evan you're right about if you work on something day after day it gets easier. I hated the first few L. T. L. 9000s I worked on,but after you learned a few tricks and shortcuts they got better. They're still a pain,but not as much foul language . I guess this thing(97 Ford) will be the same. Good thing they trade these things off at about 100k . We also had some 6. 5s in the Army and the glow plugs would swell up . A couple had to have the heads pulled because they broke off . At least they were in Blazers and Pick-ups. Doug

 

[Evan A. Beck]

*LOL* Russell...



Hey did you get rid of your cat? I hope so! Those things just don't belong on diesels!



Doug, the busted glow plugs can ruin your day... Oh well, like I say, all in a days work I guess...



***Hummers are fun to do glowplugs on too... Yikes!