also no power driving in the mountains Im like one of those semi's chuging up hill at 40 mph

 

I just read a thread that is similar in description of your problem. It is under 6.9 Forum as 1987-6-9-glow-plug-problem-290399/. I am not sure how to link you to thread. A newbie as well.

 

It sounds like you have 2 or more burned out glow plugs. Replacing them with a new set of plugs from the Ford or Navistar dealership should fix things.

As far as the lack of power in the mountains, that's typical for a naturally-aspirated diesel. If the engine starts lugging drop down a gear and get the RPMs up to keep from melting a piston.

 

Second the glow plug issue, and the mountain issue. I took my '86 6.9l crew through the Appalachian mountains and did alot of down shifting. Do you have any smoke out the tail pipe and what color. In the freak chance your lack of power is a mechanical issue it could be a bad IP, happened to me in Virginia.

 

Update I swapped out all 8 glow plugs had in motorcraft and replaced with the same 7 out of 8 were definately bad holes in them or fell apart while taking them out but it wasn't to bad and I bought a new glow plug relay and installed it...

after I was done went to turn the key and no wait to start light came on and no clicking from the relay.... dang. upon inspection i realized the chinese one from o'rilleys auto
was backwards from the original usa one so i flipped it around and still nothing. crap
so I put the original one back in and nothing. did I blow a fuse or fry something???
if so is there a 60 amp fuse hiding somewhere If anyone want my cell is 708-663-5551
or i check this 4 times a day thank you with the quick responces and all your help

 

Update .......replaced with the same 7 out of 8 were definately bad holes in them or fell apart while taking them out ..."

I'd be more concerned about what was left in the head or cylinder. It may be a blessing in disguise that it won't start.

 

IIRC you may have white and yellow wires going to the controller..... which have grey connectors check the connectors and wires for burn marks. Or you may have black connectors with orange and black wires.....

I don't think you have fusible links but check for them too.

Heres what happens:
http://static.flickr.com/34/68580047_f4ed3d46bf_b.jpg

heres a bigger view:
http://static.flickr.com/35/68580063_2b83ee30ff_b.jpg

heres what you do for the fix:
http://static.flickr.com/34/68580052_948f297467_b.jpg

Hope they work....

 

my wires look good im going to get another new relay and see if thats the issue my bypass doesn't work so not sure whats up

 

Not sure wether you just changed the relay or the whole glow plug controller, but here is the connection's.

 

mine looks just like that. ... its under the relay right? i cant find that part anywhere
at the auto parts shop the keep pulling out the bolt in one but my truck doesnt have it
also was driving and turned off the truck at the store and now no power anywhere and i cant get it started I jumped the starter and turnes over but no start

 

I replaced the positive battery cables $110 and it started up with a little starting fluid
and yes glow plugs aren't working so I need to order the glow plug controller mines located under the relay on the back middle top of the motor

what injectors are good and where to get a IP I want to tune it up and get it running right... real bogged down but I did haul 3k of 2in stone to day 15 miles

 

do you have any heavy truck guys near you? if so, ask them where they get IPs rebuilt. otherwise check out site sponsors.

 

Gotta remember these trucks aren't super power houses. And without a turbo if you're up in elevation they lose quite a lot of power. Dunno how steep of a hill you mean by "mountains" nor what gear you're in but you're not likely to be able to pull up a lot of hills in overdrive if you've an OD trans. Most of the time I do "OK" in 4th gear with mine, as long as I'm unloaded (no camper topper on mine either).

 

update I got a new glow plug controller and relay installed them and still no glow plugs
When turning the key the relay clicks on and off rapidly every 1/2 second and no wait to start light. what else could it be.

Also bought new injectors and fuel return line kit and replaced the injectors and they leaked when I started the truck then I marked the timing and took off the Ip and lines together and really torqued the injectors down on the copper washers and hooked everything back up and it wont start even with either and the block heater doesn't work
any help figuring this out is greatly appreciated any ideas on parts and tools I may need
to get it up and running again ? thanks

 

RE GPs:
Your wiring harness could be bad, grounding to that controller or the block or both could be bad.

RE Injectors:

Make sure to bleed the air out of the high pressure side or it'll take ages and ages of cranking to get the thing to try to fire. Do this by just loosening up one of the injector fuel hard lines at the injector, and crank (being mindful of not cooking your starter motor, 10-15 seconds, wait 30-60, repeat) until fuel comes out. DO NOT PUT YOUR HAND AROUND/OVER THE LOOSENED INJECTOR YOU WILL DAMAGE YOURSELF -- the fuel sprays out with more than enough pressure to cut you, and to inject itself into your blood stream.

Once you start seeing fuel dribbling from the injector you've loosened, tighten it back up. Your explanation of, and order of events makes almost no sense so I'm sort of guessing at what you did.

If you've got no WTS in the cab then light the bulb could be out, or the ground for the bulb (or chassis ground too) could be bad. Any time the relay is closed it should be getting power to that bulb. Could also be wiring issues too.

On the 1985 I've never had "fast cycling" problems, just stuck on, and nada. I actually thought only the later bullet style connectors with the different (Positive Thermal Coefficient/PTC) controller would fast cycle, but I could be totally wrong there.

 

If the engine won't start even with a shot of starting fluid you can rule out fuel delivery issues. All that's needed for ether to fire is enough compression, and valves that let the ether get into the cylinders at the right time. I think I'd pull the glow plugs and do a compression test, then post the numbers.

 

Make sure you are getting 12 volts at the FSS(Fuel Shutoff Solenoid), both with the key on and then while cranking. Checking for voltage while cranking is harder but the power comes through 2 different parts of the ignition switch. When my switch went bad I had 12 volts with the key on and 0 volts while cranking, the engine would not start on starting fluid, although it did sound like it was trying and very close to starting.

 

my truck is a 85 but has the new style of glow plug controller
can you verify the wiring on it for me just because its got to be something stupid since I replaced the gps controller and relay,

and Is it possable the old ip was working but not at 1800 psi and i could push the worn out injectors open but not the new ones? Im thinking the ip needs redone. is there a rebuild kit or a way to fix the old one or should I bite the bullet and buy a $ 350 rebuilt one?

 

my truck is a 85 but has the new style of glow plug controller
can you verify the wiring on it for me just because its got to be something stupid since I replaced the gps controller and relay,

and Is it possable the old ip was working but not at 1800 psi and i could push the worn out injectors open but not the new ones? Im thinking the ip needs redone. is there a rebuild kit or a way to fix the old one or should I bite the bullet and buy a $ 350 rebuilt one?

 

When you took the IP off, did you remove the IP gear cover?
I hope you left those 2 big bolts alone.

It can be very difficult to get the air bled out of the injector lines, it helps to have the throttle wide open while trying to bleed the air from the lines.

 

push button glow plug swich

i had the same problem with the glow plug system in my 86 f250 , i replaced the glow plugs and the solinoid and they still didnt work, eventually i just ran a push button ignition button to the tab on the solinoid to activate it and the glow plug light came on and the glow plugs worked, just find the hot tab (one of the little tabs) on the solinoid and hook that system up and hold it 5 or 6 seconds and try fireing it up, on colder days i have to hold it 8 to 10 seconds to make it fire but dont hold it too long because youll burn up your glow plugs

 

So with the manual switch, you are running power to the solenoid on the passenger side fender? and this activates the entire glow system? how do you disable it from coming on with the key? So the controller is still funtioning in this state? just shuts off when the driver lets go of the switch...


My recently aquired 84 has a good working factory GP system but I don't trust it. I want manual control

 

I installed a push button for my glow plugs also, I ran a hot wire from the fuse panel to the push button then a wire from the push button to the terminal on the GP soleniod that the purple wire is attached to, and I havent had a problem since then, I hold down the button like 10 to 20 seconds and she starts up, on colder mornings I sometimes down it twice.

 

For the 6.9 manual glow plug conversion, check out ziggsters diesel page. Ziggster's page . Its a pretty quick and simple job. Im not familiar with the later style gp control system to say if this would work the same on it.

 

So when you manually activate that relay, if you hold the push button down for longer that the usual glow time; will the controller shut off once the plugs are hot enough? Like it does from the factory.
Because this doesn't seem to bypass the controller, just the ignition switch. Seems like when we were to push the push button switch to activate the relay, the controller knows know different from key activation and would shut off when it normally does. Which is fine but isn't the controller usually the culprit in failures? Shouldn't we be bypassing it instead of the ignition switch?

Am I missing something here?

 

You are replacing the purple wire on the relay (coming from gp controler) with a hot wire with a button or switch. The controller is completely bypassed so you are activating gp's as long as you are holding switch "on". You must be careful with this setup as you can burn up gp's if you activate them to long. 6 to 8 sec. is the norm. Quality gp's will hold up much better in any case than cheap ones such as autolites.

 

Ok that clears it up, Thanks folks.