My Ford Excursion - Zombie Apocolypse/Expedition Vehicle

[DoMiNiC1]

I would want to do a couple things to a 6.0 before leaving the road, they don't exactly inspire confidence in their stock form... Not trying to piss on your snow cone, some of this may have been done... and if not its some thing you WILL want to do.

watch this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RW7JEHLYyJ4

so you don't end up posting here. read comments.....
http://www.topclassactions.com/lawsu...ction-lawsuit-

[mmuthart]

The guy in the YouTube video above gets no respect at the diesel forums. He's apparently come to some wrong conclusions and makes some bad recommendations.

In the interest of posting accurate information, I went and found this description on www.powerstroke.org of why the 6.0 is prone to blow head gaskets. This is a quote from 2Stroker:

"You need some gauges like the Edge Insight CTS or the scanGaugeII but i think your problem is your oil cooler is getting pluggged form 1. Casting Sand 2. Silicates drop out from the Ford Gold junk coolant you need to check the deltas (difference) in ECT-EOT max is 15* if you keep going you may blow the egr cooler need gauges. I did not wright this but i read it alot.
The 6.0 is known to blow head gaskets. This is why it happens. The Ford Gold coolant contains silicates. The silicates are not able to handle high EGT's generated by a good load or relatively high boost when run through the EGR cooler. They break down into a jell like sludge and fall out of suspension. This crud gets caught up in the tiny coolant passageways of the oil cooler. As the cooler clogs up it restricts coolant flow to the egr cooler. Now the egr cooler doesn't have enough coolant to carry off the heat generated by high EGT's. The limited amount of coolant in the egr cooler flash boils causing high pressure in the cooling system and the truck pukes coolant from the degas bottle due to the pressure. (it has to go somewhere)
Your uninformed Powerstroke owner is not monitoring his coolant temps and oil temps so he doesn't know whats going on and he keeps driving it this way. The problem get worse, the pressure causes the egr cooler to rupture. Now the egr cooler is leaking coolant into the intake manifold which then runs into the cylinders. Again the high combustion temps cause the coolant to vaporize. This causes unacceptably high cylinder pressure, the TTY head bolts stretch due to the additional pressure and there go your head gaskets.

Ok now you know the problem. Here's the cure. Get a good engine monitoring solution like the Edge Insight so that you can monitor your ECT and EOT. If those temps get more than 15* apart at normal cruising when at normal operating temperature your oil cooler is clogging up. Rebuild it now to prevent all that down stream damage from occurring. Flush that Ford Gold coolant cxxp out of your engine with a couple bottles of Restore. This is made specifically to clean out that silicate residue. Now refill it with a silicate free Cat EC-1 rated ELC coolant. This removes the silicates that clog the oil cooler from the equation. If you live in an area where you don't have smog inspections delete the egr system. If you can't delete it replace the egr cooler with the cooler manufactured by Bulletproof Diesel. This is vastly superior to the Ford oem egr cooler and it will not fail on you. If you find that you need to replace head gaskets replace the TTY head bolts with ARP studs and use black onyx (Victor Reinz) head gaskets or stock Ford HG's. If you have to replace the egr cooler always replace the oil cooler. That is the source of the problem.
2 stroker"

In my research before I bought my '05 Excursion, I read accounts of even ARP Head Studs stretching, allowing head gasket failure, when the above scenario takes place. In the early days of the 6.0, the above was not understood and ARP Head Studs were thought to be the solution. If your 6.0 is healthy and your are running a conservative tune (max turbo boost under ~30PSI), stock 6.0 head bolts should be fine (based on my research). I've only put 7k miles on mine (125k total), but am betting that this is the case!!

EDIT: the above quote from 2Stroker is over a year old. In this time, the Black Onyx head gaskets have been found to be unreliable. The consensus now is to use OEM Ford head gaskets if you need to replace them.

[mmuthart]

I spoke to a diesel shop in my area and considered having them do the 'bullet proofing' that I decided I would do. In the end, I did the work myself. Saved thousands and knew the work was done right. This is what I ended up doing to my 6.0 PSD:

- Upgraded the fuel pressure spring (blue spring upgrade).
- Upgraded the turbo oil drain tube.
- Replaced the OEM oil cooler with a new OEM cooler.
- Removed the EGR cooler with one of the many available kits.
- Rerouted my PVC hose so it vents to the atmosphere.
- Installed a coolant filter kit from one of many vendors.
- Found a used SCT Tuner and am now running a custom tune from Innovative diesel. (Required to clear the check engine light created from removing the EGR cooler).
- Purchased an Edge Insight monitor. (Allows monitoring of Engine Coolant/Oil temps, FICM voltage, etc.)
- Use Archoil 9100 in my oil.
- Use a cetane booster in my fuel.

What I did not do:

- replace the Ford Gold Coolant with ELC (Extended Life Coolant).
- replace the stock head bolts with ARP studs.

[sdnative13]

tagged

[Acetylene]

I had a 2003 F350 6.0 and had no problems. Traded that in on a 2006 F350 6.0 and had no problems despite working this truck very hard. However, after all of the problems by friends were having I traded the 06 in on a 2008 F350 V-10. That turned out to be a very good move as the v-10 has 110,000 and has NEVER had anything wrong with it. Having said all that, your truck is gorgeous and you should be very proud of it.