Pre-Lube

[SRehberg]

I have a friend who sold his Dodge and bought a PowerStroke (yes we should stone him) but he mentioned something that occurs on the Ford I thought was unique. When he first bought it, he discovered when he went to start it, the engine turned over quite a few times before it started. He stated his Dodge started almost instantly. He inquired at the Ford stealer, who said there is a pressure switch in the starting circuit, that won't allow it to start prior to oil pressure coming to a preset level. Seems like a good idea, and it would be simple to put a low pressue switch in the fuel solenoid circuit to do exactly the same thing. A manual switch to bypass it could be installed if the pressure switch failed. Am I missing something here or has Ford come upon a good idea?

 

[Cooker]

That's funny. I always just thought Flowerjokes were just hard starting POS's.



I don't know if I would mess around with a pressure switch, but a different oil may be more effective at achieving oil pressure at startup. Perhaps one of the best things you can do for perssure at start up is to switch away from a 15w oil, particularly in the winter months (if one lives where it gets below freezing).



JMHO

 

[dalton4]

My understanding of the Powerstroke engine is that it uses two oil pressure systems with the high side being for injector operations. This being the case, oil pressure would have to build up for the injectors to function. This makes for a slow start-up, but hey, they may have a built-in safety shutdown in case of lost oil pressure.

 

[grtescpa]

Power stroke pre-lube

I drive power strokes for the company that I work for. All the vehicles are bought on low bid contracts so I'm stuck driving what is assigned to me. The one thing that was not mention here about cold starts with the power stroke is that you have to put your foot on the acelerator to the floor befor cranking. If your not fast enough to let go on start the engine rev's up very quickly. Not something I would want to do with my own truck. The plus side to the Fords is there transmission. My company has used Dodge trucks as well as the Ford for plowing snow. All of the Dodge trucks had transmission troubles while the Fords did not. As a result Dodge lost all future bids.

 

[SRehberg]

The response regarding the injectors having to have pressure before they operate sounds reasonable. The plus side would be the ability of the bearings to receive lube prior to the engine firing, so it is sort of an added benefit. As the last post stated, it's to bad the Dodge trans can't put the power the ground, but the engine is great!