I have a 99' 7.3L. I've had it since I was 16, and I'm 18 now. It has just under 232k miles.

Yesterday I ran out of fuel (I know, big mistake.) I was rushing to the fuel station to get some fuel and it died on me about 2 miles away. Anyways,

I finally got some fuel in it and let it idle for about 5 or 10 minutes to get all the fuel back into the lines and such. Now, when I go to drive it, it acts as if it has NO power at all. It is idling just over 500 rpm's and to get it going, I almost have to mash it to the floor. When I mashed it to the floor before, it used to spin tires and dump out black smoke. Now, it struggles along and is puffing blue smoke. I know I'm low on oil, but that shouldn't be the problem yet cause I'm still showing on the stick. I'm seriously thinking it is the fuel filter or possibly even the fuel pump. What could it possibly be? And what kind of money am I going to be spending on it?

 

change the fuel filter and put some sea foam in your fuel the filter probably got water out of the bottom of tank and the sea foam will clean the pick up line and fuel system might wanna keep your oil full 7.3 is notorious for running sluggish when low that means your hpop is probably low

 

Thanks! I replaced the fuel filter this morning and ordered a new fuel pump (it's got a factory fuel pump on it) today. I'm gonna pick me up a thing of sea foam tomorrow when my check comes in and buy some oil. The napa truck comes in tomorrow so I can finally get some synthetic oil instead of mixing regular oil with my already synthetic stuff.

 

cool man let me know if it gets better

 

I put some oil in it first and tried it out. It was a gallon and a half low, and now she's running like a charm. I put a new fuel filter on her and used me some sea foam and she's runnin even better than before. My girlfriends dad is gonna give me a chip to put in it sometime over the weekend. Not exactly sure what it is. When he gives it to me, I'll askf or everyones reviews of it before installing it.

 

glad its running better for you man

 

My next stuff to do, is give it an oil change. It's a few thousand miles overdue, so that could run into problems later on. I also am going to research some cheap mods I can do for more power.

 

holyf*ck a gallon and a half low on oil??? Dude, your luck you didn't fry the turbo/motor. These heui systems NEED oil dude.

 

Thats one of the best thing about a powerstroke... It will die long before damage is done... No motor oil, no injectors firing.

Thats only half the volume, they take 3.5 gallons anyway.

 

Ya I know thats the 'pro' to a 'con'; the psd's take forever to crank due to the heui, but at the same time if there isn't enough oil to effectively run, the heui will cut it off. I couldn't remember the oil capacity on the 7.3's as I just got outta my 12v; I was thinking that was nearing the empty mark for the 7.3. But still; half capacity is running it awefully low.