Rebuild on 7.3 idi

BryantMarwitz

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Hello, so I'm new to posting in the forums here but I have used them many times to fix my truck and I'm looking to rebuild my 7.3. The reason I'm rebuilding it is because I was running through a ton of oil about a gallon every 100 miles, I know it was leaking out of some of the seals but the exhaust was blowing quite a bit of blue smoke so I figured there was some blow by. Anyways I have the engine out of the truck and looking to rebuild.

My biggest question about rebuilding it is what performance upgrades would y'all recommend? I know putting a turbo on it would be ideal and I plan to in the future but I currently don't really have the funds the rebuild the engine correctly and put a turbo on it. So my question is will it run okay with say the cam shaft from R&D performance without a turbo on it? Or any other internals that would be better suited for a turbo.
 

saburai

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Low on funds? Skip the cam. Studs, comp 910 valve springs and a fresh turbo spec fuel system along with a detailed and quality rebuild would be the right direction. You might want to research the 6.9 cooling mod. Really tight? Skip the springs unless yours are played. Turn up the fuel and add a turbo system latter as funds alow.
 

Thewespaul

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It’s the 7.3 cooling mod, it involves knocking out the coolant plugs in the corners of the 7.3 block and head, and using a 6.9 headgasket. The 6.9 doesn’t need this mod since it doesn’t have these plugs
 

IDIBRONCO

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I made a thread a while back called "7.3 cooling mod". I tried to explain everything so that even somebody who's mechanically challenged could understand what I did. It's kind of long, but I also tried to go step by step to help explain it. You could check it out.
 

gerlbaum

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One thing I did, if you are rebuilding your heads I would upgrade to the stellite exhaust valves. These are the valves used on the turbo engine. I think they used inconel or something but Rock Auto sells stellite ones from engine tech. Cheap upgrade at $11.07 per valve or $88 for both heads.

I searched inconel vs stellite and it appears both are very good or equal to one another (maybe someone who knows more about it could educate me).

http://www.rockauto.com/en/catalog/?carcode=1124110&parttype=5328&a=avl5579370c1124110
 

WarNose

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One thing I did, if you are rebuilding your heads I would upgrade to the stellite exhaust valves. These are the valves used on the turbo engine. I think they used inconel or something but Rock Auto sells stellite ones from engine tech. Cheap upgrade at $11.07 per valve or $88 for both heads.

I searched inconel vs stellite and it appears both are very good or equal to one another (maybe someone who knows more about it could educate me).

http://www.rockauto.com/en/catalog/?carcode=1124110&parttype=5328&a=avl5579370c1124110

I work as a pipefitter in oil refineries, where we use both inconel and stellite. Both are very expensive metals that have excellent wear properties at high temperatures. But stellite is too brittle by itself. We only use it to hardface the inside of pipe. Inconel is not so brittle that it cannot stand by itself. But it is so expensive, that it is still only used as a hardfacing inside the larger pipes.

Considering this, I would guess that the valves made of inconel are better. Those valves on RockAuto must only be hardfaced in stellite. Maybe that is good enough for our application though. I would would buy them over valves without hardfacing at that price.
 

gerlbaum

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Thank you for the info. From my searches it does looks like all the stellite valves are just coated as you said. I've not seen the actual inconel valves offered anywhere so I'm not sure of the price difference. But the stellite ones are only $2 or so more.

I work as a pipefitter in oil refineries, where we use both inconel and stellite. Both are very expensive metals that have excellent wear properties at high temperatures. But stellite is too brittle by itself. We only use it to hardface the inside of pipe. Inconel is not so brittle that it cannot stand by itself. But it is so expensive, that it is still only used as a hardfacing inside the larger pipes.

Considering this, I would guess that the valves made of inconel are better. Those valves on RockAuto must only be hardfaced in stellite. Maybe that is good enough for our application though. I would would buy them over valves without hardfacing at that price.
 

Thewespaul

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I’ve got a good stock of the idit valves from used heads, I use them in high power builds that are on an NA block and heads, seems they hold up better than the coated ones you can buy now, even tho they are used.
 

WarNose

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Did the IDIT come with different valve seat material too? When upgrading to inconel or stellite valves, I wonder if the valve seats would need to be upgraded as well?
 

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