How much longer does my engine have?

[JeffMoss1]

Hey everyone,

I bought my E-350, 1990 from a guy who kept it in pretty good condition (from what I can tell) with 250,000 miles on it. He was the second owner of it. I've replaced a bunch of components that needed it and everything on it is working really nicely.

I just flushed my whole cooling system, installed a coolant filter, and added SCA precharged coolant instead of what it already had in there. I've read the articles on cavitation and such, but i'm curious as to how much life anyone thinks it has left in it?

In retrospect, before I flushed the coolant, i should have checked to see if it already had additives in it. I'm assuming it didn't, but to be honest i don't know. Assuming i'm the first to give it SCA's at 250,000 miles, does anyone have a guess on how much further it'll go before it cavitates or throws something expensive? Also, is there anything else I can do to prolong it?

Also he said that a lot of the miles he put on it were highway miles driving back and forth from Penn to Fla, but I can only guess how much of that it was.

I bought it for cheap, really just to fiddle with it and to learn about diesels, so my expectations aren't high, don't worry about bursting my bubble.

Keep it real!

~Jeff

 

[icanfixall]

Not all 7.3 motors cavitate. With the miles on your motor I would feel its a fair guess that you have around 100,000 to 150,000 miles left. Even that is just a guess. Without knowing now it was really used and maintained the future of the motor and trans is up in the air. I would guess its had at least 2 injection pumps on it and hopefully 2 sets of injectors. The headgaskets may need to be changed out if they have not been done yet. The oil cooler o-rings probably close to being done. If you start seeing oil in the coolant its time. Some motors run almost forever with just small problems. Others can't seem to get around the block without something wrong. Overall these motors run very well with very little problems. Then, If something happens its really alot cheaper to fix than the "newer" trucks that are all computor controlled.

 

[TLBREWER]

If the truck doesn't have signs of cavitation at this point and you have started the preventative maintenance (SCA's), chances are good that you will not experience it. That's not a guarantee, but in theory it won't progress with preventative measures. On the other hand, if cavitation does set in, your diesel "education" will be greatly accelerated.

Tom

 

[JeffMoss1]

Thanks for the info guys, that's more than i'd hoped for. I

I guess it wouldn't be stupid to just replace some of that stuff before it starts going bad, would it? I'm going to see if I can get in touch with the guy who had it before me to see when the headgaskets, and injectors were replaced last...oil cooler orings seems like something easy.

Thanks again for all the help.

~Jeff