Hello all, I am new here and this is my first post. I have a 2004 F250 with a 6.0L turbo diesel engine. I bought it from a friend of mine 6 years ago and up until last winter, had absolutely no issues with it. The beginning of last winter, the truck started being hard to start and progressively got worse. by the end of last winter, it would turn over 8-9 times before starting and when it finally crunk up, it sounded like two elves were under the hood sword fighting with pots and pans! If you didn't let the truck sit for 10-15 minutes and warm up at idle, it would act as if it was starved for fuel. I was running late one morning and didn't have time to wait for it to warm up so, I crunk it up, waited a couple minutes, and pulled out of the driveway. The truck stuttered and acted as if it had no power. I couldn't drive faster that 10-15 miles per hour or the truck would begin violently shaking like all the cylinders werent firing. At one point, I got it up to 40 and it lost all power. The RPM gauge dropped to idle RPM's and no matter how I mashed the gas, the truck slowed down. I pulled over and let it sit. It eventually reved back up and I made it to work. I work 6 miles from my house so it wasn't a long trip. I had a diesel mechanic hook a computer up to it to see what was going on, but his box wouldn't read the computer and he couldn't figure it out. The check engine light (or any other light) never came on. He suggested changing the oil so I went to the Ford dealer and had the truck serviced. No change.

As soon as summer came back around, the problem disappeared and the truck ran fine. I haven't had this issue all summer long, but now that we have had 2 or 3 cool days, it is starting to act up again. I noticed last winter that the colder it got, the worse it got. Last night it was only 60 degrees F but when I got in the truck to come to work, the truck started the same hard to start and rough idle it did last winter. A friend told me the other day that it might be the FICM messing up. Would the FICM only do that in the cold if it were going bad??

I have to replace the sway bar linkage bushings, fix a leak in the rear end, and fix a fuel leak under the hood (all 3 happened over the last month) so I am not against fixing the truck so long as it is economically viable. I love my truck and want to keep it, but I have to have a reliable way to go, cold or not, so I am debating trading it in on something else. Any help with this mystery would be greatly appreciated.

 

Hello,
I have an 06 Ford F250. My truck ran exactly like yours. Exactly, but only when cold! When I plugged my truck in and heated up my oil the problem went away. Many of my friends thought it was the FICM. But if it were why would the truck only run bad when cold! Here's the fix, Ford put out a TSB on this exact issue. My mechanic buddy saw this and ordered software from Ford and loaded that software update on to my truck and it fixed the problem. Apparently when cold the spool sticks in the injectors. The software update causes the truck to heat the oil up to a high temp and it fixes the issue. I believe there is more to that, but go to the Ford dealer and have the software updated that relates to the FICM. Load that up and you probably fixed your truck. All told it cost me 50 bucks to gain access to the ford software and my buddy loaded the update for free. Let me know if this works. Ford is throwing money at injectors, FICM"s not remembering to update your computer software.