If he used Starting fluid
Eh... Problems with starting fluid is overrated.
Beyond a few IDI owners who use ether injection and have for many years, I got an "ether addicted" truck a long time ago.
When my dad bought it, it would not start cold without ether.
After a few years, I ended up going over the glow plug system, making a nice manual system.
What do you know, it suddenly started up just fine. No ether needed after that... despite having been started on ether for *years*.
Now, I will agree that glow plugs and ether don't mix - you always want to disconnect your glow plugs if you want to use ether... Usually, though, people use ether because the glow plugs aren't working in the first place.
On top of that, well... I've bought 6 IDIs. 5 of them had starting issues. I've fixed them with a combination of glow plugs and fixing retarded timing due to the IP being worn out.
All I'm saying is, for the right price, don't give up just because it won't start cold. Understand why, get it for a lower price and fix it yourself.
And, for those who are thinking that hard to start is low compression... that's going to be pretty rare.
I had one 7.3 motor I pulled to have it rebuilt. It had a good .020" of bore taper, broken rings, worn bearings... It ate a quart of oil every 100 miles, easy. With working glow plugs and a good fuel system on it, it would fire up within 3 revolutions even at 20F.
It's pretty darn hard to make an IDI have little enough compression to not start, with good glow plugs.