Help!! Engine is a bust.

[blueheronbus]

Hello all,
My boyfriend and I bought a 2002 International T444E 7.3L powerstroke back in August. We’ve gotten the bus ready on the inside to start building our furniture into it but we found out yesterday at the diesel shops that we have a rod knock a blown head gasket and failed injectors in our engine. In other words the worst case scenario has happened and we need a brand new engine. We can’t afford/ aren’t willing to spend another $8K on a brand new engine and the shop we currently have it at now will not put in a used engine for us per their policy. Does anybody have some suggestions on what they would do or has anybody ever been halfway through their conversion and then lose their engine? Anything helps!

[peteg59]

Find another shop that will install a used engine?

Or cut your losses and find another bus?

This scenario is exactly why it is of utmost importance to thoroughly check out any potential bus mechanically before purchase.

Good luck, going forward...

[ISAF2009]

There are no new t444’s only remans which are often Not as good as low mileage used oem. Either way that is 25 hours of labor plus the cost of the engine so 8k isn’t crazy. Where are you located?

[Booyah45828]

If the bus runs, take it elsewhere and get a 2nd opinion. Don't tell the 2nd shop what the 1st said or found. If the 2 shop's findings match, I'd personally sell or scrap the thing and cut your losses. You'll likely have more in the repair then what you gave for the bus.

You could always do the rebuild/replacement yourself, but if you had that capability, you likely wouldn't be here asking us what to do.

Ditto to the pre-purchase inspection, but that doesn't do jack for you right now. And those inspections don't always reveal everything. But if you have a rod knock, bad injectors, AND a bad head gasket, that stuff didn't all just show up overnight.....

[EastCoastCB]

I'd limp the bus home and sell it.
Depending on what you paid you could even still break even.

If you've got time and $ in it then take it somewhere that will slap a used engine in it.

8k is actually a damn decent price on a reman engine installed.
For my 2003 DT466E I was quoted nearly 10k for just a timing cover job.

Buses are very expensive to repair. Plan on having 5-10 grand as an emergency bus repair fund.

[cadillackid]

are they sure its a rod knock? bad injectors on these engines will sound like rod knock.. what test did they do to show that the head gasket is bad and not the Oil cooler? oil cooler failures are somewhat common on these

[ISAF2009]

I did a reseal, cups, and a turbo on a t444 and we billed $9200. Get a second diagnosis from another shop. Head gaskets are rare more often its cups that mix coolant with oil. But the knock and injector wouldn’t surprise me If coolant made its way into the combustion chamber. That would be a spontaneous and catastrophic failure.

[TJones]

8k is a good price for reman. I decided to put a reman 7.3 in my 2001 f350 and it was 10k. Nice thing about the reman is it had all new fuel system, engine sensors, turbo and came with a warranty.

Ted

[BeNimble]

Makes the price of lithium batteries look cheap when replacing an engine is $10k !!

[cadillackid]

9k seems pretty high for cups!! unless it was a full reseal involving pulling the engine and redoing dipstick and oil pan gaskets as well as rear / front mains, and oil cooler rebuild.



this is also another good reason to DRIVE YOUR BUS!!! befiore you get solidly into conversion.. its one thingto buy a bus thats a dud and have to part it out, scrap it or sell for a loss, but really sucks if you get far into a conversion and discover it has major-league issues..

[Ronnie]

well not really a help but yes we lost an engine on the first trip. While waiting for the tow truck we bought another engine off craigslist. Actually just bought a complete dump truck to take the engine and trans our of it. Wanted a manual trans anyway.



I would get a second opinion. They could be right but not feeling it right now....

[cadillackid]

Originally Posted by Ronnie

well not really a help but yes we lost an engine on the first trip. While waiting for the tow truck we bought another engine off craigslist. Actually just bought a complete dump truck to take the engine and trans our of it. Wanted a manual trans anyway.



I would get a second opinion. They could be right but not feeling it right now....

agreed it happens!! I drove my superior 2700 miles home no major issues.. then 25 miles into another trip the rear end started getting noisy fast and I barely made it the 25 miles home before the pinion gear literally fell apart in pieces,,.

[CHEESE_WAGON]

Another thought...

What does the oil pressure gauge show? I recently drove a T444E bus from AZ to NY, and observed oil pressure readings of approximately 50 psi idling cold, 25-35 idling warm, and 40-45 warmed up and cruising. This bus made a 2800 mile trip with relatively minor issues (air compressor had some issues, but no real issues in the major mechanicals during the trip).

Any kind of bearing damage will produce lower oil pressure numbers than a healthy engine would. IF your oil pressure is showing about the same as above, not likely to be a rod knock. If oil pressure is low as well, then bearing damage is possible, and likely. Although factory gauges are not known for perfect accuracy either.

I would certainly get a second opinion, but on the contingency that this could be injector problems, I would not drive it, I would have it towed. Driving a diesel with such a misfire can and will cause damage.

Depending on your area, as you get further north, there will likely be a good supply of rusted-out diesel Ford Super Duty F-series and E-series vans, with lower miles and hours, in which the engines are basically the same engine from 96-03 with a couple differences that should be of no consequence if used in a bus. Good source for a good used replacement.

One other thing, these engines are not really meant to push much past 2200 rpm, if it has exceeded 2200 for an extended length of time, it is possible the engine is damaged. But verify through oil pressure readings and a second opinion.

The 7.3 / T444/E is happiest at 1800-2000, I don't know why Navistar set the RPM governor so high on these -- 2600 rpm on the one I transported recently.

[cadillackid]

Originally Posted by CHEESE_WAGON

Another thought...

What does the oil pressure gauge show? I recently drove a T444E bus from AZ to NY, and observed oil pressure readings of approximately 50 psi idling cold, 25-35 idling warm, and 40-45 warmed up and cruising. This bus made a 2800 mile trip with relatively minor issues (air compressor had some issues, but no real issues in the major mechanicals during the trip).

Any kind of bearing damage will produce lower oil pressure numbers than a healthy engine would. IF your oil pressure is showing about the same as above, not likely to be a rod knock. If oil pressure is low as well, then bearing damage is possible, and likely. Although factory gauges are not known for perfect accuracy either.

I would certainly get a second opinion, but on the contingency that this could be injector problems, I would not drive it, I would have it towed. Driving a diesel with such a misfire can and will cause damage.

Depending on your area, as you get further north, there will likely be a good supply of rusted-out diesel Ford Super Duty F-series and E-series vans, with lower miles and hours, in which the engines are basically the same engine from 96-03 with a couple differences that should be of no consequence if used in a bus. Good source for a good used replacement.

One other thing, these engines are not really meant to push much past 2200 rpm, if it has exceeded 2200 for an extended length of time, it is possible the engine is damaged. But verify through oil pressure readings and a second opinion.

The 7.3 / T444/E is happiest at 1800-2000, I don't know why Navistar set the RPM governor so high on these -- 2600 rpm on the one I transported recently.

thats Low governer.. these engines run 3200 RPM in the ford trucks and they do it for a long period of time.. the engine is in fact happiest at 1800-2000 NOT-OVERLOADED!! meaning you are loading it hard.. (engine load factor under 65%,, run the load factor over 65% and you can hear them strain at that RPM.. but 2600 RPM while hungry for fuel is not dangerous to the engine.. esp when you look at the stroke length and piston speeds itsn ot excessive at all..



even a DT466 with a longer stroke and heavier pistons.. and rods that arent all that much heavier duty is allowed to spin at 2600.. again abother engine happiest at 1800-2000..



using a ford engine late99 plus requires either a camshaft change or an E-fuel conversion on the bus. as the fords didnt have mechanical fuel pumps after early 99.

[CHEESE_WAGON]

Originally Posted by cadillackid

thats Low governer.. these engines run 3200 RPM in the ford trucks and they do it for a long period of time.. the engine is in fact happiest at 1800-2000 NOT-OVERLOADED!! meaning you are loading it hard.. (engine load factor under 65%,, run the load factor over 65% and you can hear them strain at that RPM.. but 2600 RPM while hungry for fuel is not dangerous to the engine.. esp when you look at the stroke length and piston speeds itsn ot excessive at all..

More RPM = More stress, more heat = harder on the oil, internals and cooling system. I'd be willing to bet that one of these run below 2300 all its life would last about 50-80% longer than an engine run 2500-3200 all its life -- regardless of what is or is not considered excessive. Just because you can do something, doesn't mean you should. It's a proven fact that driving habits have a direct and profound impact on engine life.

Fun fact - the bus in question I moved from AZ-NY... 1800 at 55, 2000 at 60, 2200 at 62-63, 2400 at 65. The first leg of the trip (Phoenix AZ - Van Horn TX) averaged 7.8 mpg at 63. The second leg (Van Horn TX - Gainesville TX) averaged 8.9 mpg at 58-60 switching to secondaries to facilitate lower speed to avoid potential damage. The third leg (Gainesville TX - Columbus KS) averaged 11.8 at 50-58 mph. Could it have survived a 2500-mile trip at 2600 rpm? Maybe. But I'm not trying to find out the hard way that it won't. You run something at the limit for long enough, and it will break. That's the law of averages.

[cadillackid]

Originally Posted by CHEESE_WAGON

More RPM = More stress, more heat = harder on the oil and internals. I'd be willing to bet that one of these run below 2300 all its life would last about 50-80% longer than an engine run 2500-3200 all its life -- regardless of what is or is not considered excessive. Just because you can do something, doesn't mean you should. It's a proven fact that driving habits have a direct and profound impact on engine life.

in a non lugging environment yes.. but the average person would lug the hell out of it if it were geared to top out at 1800-2000. and thats more damaging than running it at the 2600 navistar says is the Long life RPM..



theres a reason why the optimal allison shift table downshifts into higher RPMs MUCH quicker than a gas engine.. lugging is dangerous..



obviously navistar designed for long life.. ford wanted to win consumer brownie points.. higher revs a few more horsepower (that torque over time thing)..



V8 diesels like revs more than inline 6's do.. 9 litre anyone? im not saying you want to optimally smack an engine against its governer all day long for MPG and fuel economy but to question why navistar set the governer there when its clearly in a safe zone for the engine.. theres times you need those RPMs.. that said ive seen North carolina busses with healthy engines and over 200k miles on them. when they used to ship them with 7.17 gears in them for a whopping top speed of 48.. the drivers just buried em at the redline day in and day out..

[CHEESE_WAGON]

Maybe so, but with 2M+ driving experience and nearly 500k of it driving 18-wheelers, I'm pretty sure I know when an engine is lugging, and I think most people with common sense would too. You can't help but notice when the whole vehicle shakes from the harmonic vibrations...

I might also add that the larger the engine, the less it lends itself to higher RPMs. Nor does it really need to, as a larger displacement makes more low-end torque and reduces lugging and the need to reach higher RPMs.

[flattracker]

I am in the middle of getting a 7.3L IDI-t engine replaced in a 93 Ford F250. I am having a mechanic do all the work. He was able to get a re-man engine from the east coast for $1650 (incl shipping) He is charging me $1100 labor for the swap. I chose to replace the bolt-ons with new/rebuilt components, which added some to the cost. Out here in rural Oregon they don't salt the roads so there is no rot on the vehicle. 4WD vehicles are worth substantially more here so it was worth it. When I had to replace the engine in the "new Crown" it ran up into $11-$12K range, but that entailed a lot of labor (I had the lower end bearings/seals replaced during the work.) This entailed replacing a Cummins Big Cam Engine. I think $2k - $2.5K would be fair labor. I would guess you are replacing a power stroke, so maybe $2-$3k for a real nice power stroke. I think a fair price would be $6K for all.

[ISAF2009]

Yup engine out, moroso oil pan gasket, welded dipstick, arp studs water pump with coolant filter the whole 9 yards new turbo and all.

[cadillackid]

Originally Posted by CHEESE_WAGON

Maybe so, but with 2M+ driving experience and nearly 500k of it driving 18-wheelers, I'm pretty sure I know when an engine is lugging, and I think most people with common sense would too. You can't help but notice when the whole vehicle shakes from the harmonic vibrations...

I might also add that the larger the engine, the less it lends itself to higher RPMs. Nor does it really need to, as a larger displacement makes more low-end torque and reduces lugging and the need to reach higher RPMs.

You know about lugging most dont.
The V8 diesels lug much easier than the online engines do.. thus the fix is to run them at higher rpm where they won’t lug.

Why do you think most heavy engines are inline bs V?
They taught whole classes back in the day on how to drive the 6V and 8V Detroit’s to avoid lugging..

This discussion is about 7.e V8, not the big class 8 in-line your drive millions of miles on.

The computer and my pyro tell me how easily the 444e lugs.. but that’s right computers are evil.. I never let it shudder the bus.. computer gives me a lower gear and more rpm and yeah it works..

Inline engine? Yep they are long stroke and hate rpm but the V8 are different.