Thinking of looking at an idi and have some questions

[onus]

What would cause an idi to start and run for 5 minutes and shut off. Also how would i go about testing for cavitation? Sca test strips? It is a 7.3. Any other things i should look out for besides the common ford stuff. I already have another f250 so i know those issues.

 

[gatorman21218]

You cant test for cavitation only SCAs. Unless there is water in the oil, oil in water, hydrolocked or burning lots of coolant, i would say its not cavitated (yet) You can also pressure test the cooling system and pull the heads to see if its ******* through, but I doubt you want to go that far into it for a test. As far as Scas go there are two kinds DCA2 and DCA4. Not sure which brand is which but varius manufactureres will sell test kits. I myself use Fleetcharge, not to be confused with Fleetguard. It comes precharged with SCAs

 

[icanfixall]

Welcome to the forum where you get free help just for the asking... Running the SCA test strips will help but... No real world way to test the block for cavitation. Its mostly thought it kills blocks from a low of arounf 60,000 miles but up to as high as 150,000 miles... Some never worm out even when not taken care of. Those are the rare blocks. Generally speaking if a block is taken care of with proper sca and coolant it will last many 100,000 of miles. About running for 5 minutes and shutting down... Could be plenty of issues.... These engines run on diesel and at least 9 volts running to the shutoff solenoid in the injection pump so... If air is getting into the feed line from the tanks that will air lock the fuel system. If this engine has an electrical issue it will shut down too. Now to rule out the electrical issue run a jumper wire from any positive off the battery. Connect it to the shutoff solenoid on the injection pump. Thats found on the front top of the injection pump. Its the large connecter. Run the engine and see if it stays running. Remove it and see if it dies... A fuel issue is going to be a little tuffer to figure out but... While the engine is running try depressing the shrader valve on the filter head. Thats the tire air valve looking thing. If air comes out each time you open this valve then you know air is getting in someone. Air trapped in the injection pump will kill the engine. Hope this gets you some answers...

 

[onus]

Thanks a ton i'll have to check those. Hopefully i don't end up telling the person whats wrong with it. So i can get it cheaper and hopefully drive it home instead of a tow. It has 200,000 miles so it was probably maintained with sca at some point. You'll probably see me around here more often.

 

[Russ]

5 mins? I'm wondering is if the cold advance, and Fuel shut off wires on the injection pump got switched somehow?

 

[onus]

Thats what i heard over at fte. Another guy i guess was going to look at it and that possible issue came up. The current ad does not state the time issue but an older one does. The member passed it over and since he saw it in person i asked him what was wrong with it but just waiting back for that one. What way are the wires supposed to be oriented so i can check for that?