Ford 7.3L Godzilla cam issue; Tell me what you think

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I had 3 Transit high roof's in my fleet, 2 350 HD's with duals, one 250 HD AWD, one of the 350's was totaled, using the diesel oil in those too.
The AWD I change the oil in the PTU and front diff every 25k, that van is low miles though, only new drivers drive it so it doesn't get the 1,000+ miles a week my other vans do.
We have a 120K Ford Extended Warranty on the newer Transits, so we pretty much stick with Ford’s recommended 5W20-but my 10R80 isn’t making it to 120K, no way.
 
Possibly, the higher vitamins and minerals in it might provide more protection, but we may never know for 100% if this I the reason why it lasted this long or not.
The higher levels of ZDDP in the 15W40 would provide better protection than garden variety 5W30. Our issues with Ford are pretty legendary over the 25 years I’ve been there, box trucks with 3 blown E4ODs over 140K or so, 6.0 liter PSD E-350s needing the body removed to replace head gaskets, 3 VV turbo failures on one van… I don’t know how they’ve paid for it all!
 
This is in a 2020 Ford F-59 delivery van, it has 122k on it. I am the fleet manager and I have a fleet of these to take care of.
I use 15w-40 conventional diesel oil, 10,000 mile oil changes.
This van is rode hard and put away wet 6 days a week, dirt roads, stop and go all day long. 8-10hrs a day.
The cam shaft delaminates, which causes the lifters to not roll over the cam lobes smoothly, then the lifters go bad.
If you let it go long enough the engine will grenade.
Catch it soon enough, replace the cam and lifters, good to go.
Ford got a bad batch of cam's as this was made during Covid.

I have video of it running and making noise, but the forum won't let me upload it.
What is your maintenance plan now that this occurred?
 
What is your maintenance plan now that this occurred?

Once I get it back in service, it's going to run for one day and then I'm going to change the oil again, they drained it to replace the cam.
So that should flush out any contaminants that remain, then it'll get changed again at 130,xxx, then again at 140,xxx...and so on and so fourth.
It's how I've been doing it from day one, and how I'm going to continue doing it.
Oil changes won't make much difference on a defective part, and I still have to keep over all costs down.
Out of 50 trucks, 10 with this engine, only one has gone bad, but this is the highest mileage one of these engines in my fleet.
I have Freightliners with 600k on them with the Mercedes 4.3 and Cummins 6.7. The Mercedes is a bullet proof engine, the Cummins sucks.
 
What answer do you think I'll find?
Ford recommends following the oil life monitor OR 10k, whichever is sooner.
The oil life monitor on all of my vans comes on around 7500 miles.
Ford RECOMMENDS 5w30 full syn.
This is Ford's HD engine, it does not have a non severe service interval.

Funny thing is the manual does have multiple severe duty recommendations, all for 5000 miles. The F59 manual has them plain as day. Fwiw, our fleet follows the severe duty schedule with the same chassis.
 
Once I get it back in service, it's going to run for one day and then I'm going to change the oil again, they drained it to replace the cam.
So that should flush out any contaminants that remain, then it'll get changed again at 130,xxx, then again at 140,xxx...and so on and so fourth.
It's how I've been doing it from day one, and how I'm going to continue doing it.
Oil changes won't make much difference on a defective part, and I still have to keep over all costs down.
Out of 50 trucks, 10 with this engine, only one has gone bad, but this is the highest mileage one of these engines in my fleet.
I have Freightliners with 600k on them with the Mercedes 4.3 and Cummins 6.7. The Mercedes is a bullet proof engine, the Cummins sucks.
Thank you, and appreciate you sharing this information.

Side question, I am looking to stock up a little on 15w40, maybe 5 gallons. I am a hobbyist but not professional. Which brand would you recommend? I am thinking going cheap, either traveller, delo, or rotella on the upper end.
 
Thank you, and appreciate you sharing this information.

Side question, I am looking to stock up a little on 15w40, maybe 5 gallons. I am a hobbyist but not professional. Which brand would you recommend? I am thinking going cheap, either traveller, delo, or rotella on the upper end.

Depends on the application, I use Performance Plus, I buy it by the 55gal drum.
My personal choices, in order, Rosella, Delo, then Chevron.
 
Thanks for the info on these 7.3l's. Our new E450 chassis's at work get 5w30 and supposed to be at 5k oci. Most are changed at 5-6k but occasionally some go further. Was not aware of the cam issues and will be on the lookout for them as our oldest 7.3 are coming up on 90k miles.
 
Thanks for the info on these 7.3l's. Our new E450 chassis's at work get 5w30 and supposed to be at 5k oci. Most are changed at 5-6k but occasionally some go further. Was not aware of the cam issues and will be on the lookout for them as our oldest 7.3 are coming up on 90k miles.

Google the cam issue, you'll find ton's of info on it.
Also, the e plug wires are absolute garbage, so are the plugs. I've switched all of mine to Iridium plugs and Massive Performance plug wires.
I was getting random misfires as soon as 50k.
 
Google the cam issue, you'll find ton's of info on it.
Also, the e plug wires are absolute garbage, so are the plugs. I've switched all of mine to Iridium plugs and Massive Performance plug wires.
I was getting random misfires as soon as 50k.
Only thing we have had with them was one motor started to have valvetrain noise, ~75k, that one got Schaeffer 5w40 and helped quiet it down a lot.
 
My question would be hours not miles.

I have seen gas engines idling for eight hours at a rest stop heating the cab as if the engine were diesel. Many gas engines don't do well idling regularly for eight hours at a time, especially on a regular basis.
 
MPG is around 6.5.
Others in my industry use cheap full syn 5w-30, change it every 5-6k and replace their engines every 150-175k, all sludge up and smoking.
Not a single one of mine use any oil between oil changes.
I add 8 qts, I get 8 qts back.


…….. whats “cheap full syn”? I have a very hard time believing that an engine will fail at 150k, full of sludge, with 5-6k syn oil changes.
 
Maybe its time to dump all the fancy computer design programs, and go find some old retired engineer in his mid 80's that still knows how to use use a slide rule to show them all how to fix the problem. 😍
Let the EPA lighten up a little bit on the automakers, make the mpg goals a little more realistic, and give the automakers a bit more flexibility with ICE. If that happened my bet is a lot of these problems and complex engine designs go away. But we all know that's not going to happen. ;)
 
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