I recently purchased a 2005 F-350 (SRW), crew cab, 4 x 4,auto trans, 6.0L from a rancher friend of mine. It has 98K miles and has never been off of the ranch. It has been well maintained and dealer serviced sincenew. He told me he had nothing but problems w/ it and sold it me for next to nothing. I talked to a good friend who owns an '05 F-450 and a mechanic that works on diesels. Both advised me against buying one, but for what little it cost, I took a chance. It's in the shop for a no start problem that the seller will pay for, then I'll pick it up. I don't really do much towing, I just need a crew cab 4x4. Did I make a big mistake? Any advice?

 

welcome to diesel bombers glad you could join us and i hope not hopefully everything has been taken care of and if you got a good deal on it that gives you some room to mess with it good luck to you

 

I would really think about studding your heads this may prevent any future issues. The 6.0 is known for having head gasket issues studding your heads now may prevent you from blowing a head gasket down the road. I could probably get this to you for 550-600 bucks depending on how fancy you wanted to get-Mars 4x4 Performance

 

Moved for better exposure. Good luck

 

I'm planning on spending some $. The body and interior are fine. Besides studding the heads (I don't know what that is), are there any basic aftermarket things to extend life, prevent big engine problems and increase hp and fuel economy?

 

I would start with air intake, 4inch turbo back exhaust, and a light safe programmer like Edge or Banks. I have installed A LOT of these and this is your best bet for horsepower gains without losing MPGs.

 

That seems to the consensus: cold air, up-sized exhaust and chip. I'm told I should be able to get all that done for $1500- $2000. Does that sound about right to you?

 

Well I'm going to 100% disagree with everything posted so far, except the head studs.

First, what are your plans with this truck? Just a DD? Will you tow? Are you looking to make some power?....

The factory uses what is called a "torque to yield" bolt, or TTY bolt. It is designed to stretch and hold a clamping force on the head, but have been known to fail quite commonly on modded trucks and in a few cases on stock trucks. Most guys throw in ARP headstuds, which can be had for under $400 including shipping. You will NEED to have the heads machined flat at a performance shop (try and find one in your area that has worked on 6.0 heads) and pressure checked.

The stock intake is a GREAT unit and will be enough to support up to 500+rwhp, so buying an intake may be a waste of money, depending on what you want to do with this truck. For the most part anyone who does buy one is just looking to use a reusable filter and make changes easier (the stock setup is sort of a pain to change, but doesn't need to be done very often so it's not terrible).

An EGR delete kit would be a great investment. Sinister diesel and River City Diesel (RCD) both sell kits on ebay for around $300 shipped and some guys have done the "make an offer" and got them as low as $250 shipped. The EGR valve and EGR cooler are also problem causers on the 6.0 so eliminating them is a great idea.

Another relatively inexpensive investment but a good one is a coolant filter. These can be found at www.dieselsite.com and are around $125. The 6.0 blocks are sand-cast from the factory so over time sand parts will break up and pass through the coolant system and usually end up in the oil cooler, which restricts flow of coolant and this can lead to premature failure of your EGR cooler and then headgaskets too. It's a thing that should have come on 6.0's factory but didn't...

I would do these things FIRST, before you get into a programmer (btw, there are no "chips" for 6.0s, programmers only, and there are also what I call "foolers" like the banks and others that don't really program, but I'll get into that....) If I could do mine all over again, I would do this stuff first, then get the power added.

For power, a 4" (or5" if you want) turbo back is a good start, you wont notice much power, but you will want it once you add more power to keep EGT's down. A set of gauges would also be a good investment before really turning up the wick.

SCT programmers are hands down the best programmer out there for the 6.0 It one of VERY FEW actual programmers, and has the largest following of tuners who will write you custom tunes for your truck. Custom tunes are what you want! SCT will also tune the transmission on your truck. The 5R110 is a great tranny but like any auto tranny, you add power and the life goes down. The custom tuning offered for the SCT's will help the tranny last a long time though. Edge, Banks, Bullydog, and so on... these only raise line pressure and do nothing else. They will defuel during shifting to "save" the tranny, but that's it. They technically can't even program the truck, they plug into the OBD port and just send false signals into the PCM to fool it into adding more fuel and timing.

If you choose to do more mods down the road like a turbo and bigger injectors, you NEED to get the SCT anyways, since you will need the custom tunes for the bigger mods. The SCT X-cal3 runs around $425 with three free custom tunes when purchased from Innovative Diesel (regarded to be one of the best tuners out there), and there is an $80 charge for an extreme upgrade. I would highly recommend this, but your rear tires will hate you.

Sort of long winded here, but I think I covered all the bases... any questions just ask.

 

That seems to the consensus: cold air, up-sized exhaust and chip. I'm told I should be able to get all that done for $1500- $2000. Does that sound about right to you?

---AutoMerged DoublePost---

Thanks for your input. Let me try to give you some background. It will just be a daily driver for me. I tow a 2 horse gooseneck/single axle trailer a couple of times a month on short trips, that's all.

I'm not looking for bad *** power, just fuel efficiency and avoiding major problems. I'd like to get as much life out of it as I can. I paid less than $6K for it and I like everything about it, I'm just unfamiliar with 6.0's and haven't heard anything good about them.

I've been told 6.0's are notorious for EGR, fuel pump seal and injector problems. I'm just looking for all of the informed help I can get.

 

I suggest you drive the truck for awhile and see how it performs for you. Keep reading and posting up here to discover more information about the "issues". If you search for fuel pump seal I doubt you will find anything regarding the 6.0L.

You need to read Mdud707's reply SEVERAL TIMES. There's VERY good advice there and I would just be repeating what he has already suggested.