check engine light flashes......

[jopes]

I was towing home last night from our fund raiser. my check engine light was flickering alot while pulling long hills. Trailer in tow was about 8500 lbs with another 1000 lbs in the bed of the truck.

Typically I am driving with a 3.9k resistor but for towing I drop it back to a 5.4k which keeps my temps in tow usually under 1200 on long up hill blasts.

boost levels where it was flickering was around 11 psi to 14/15 psi with most of them happening around 13.

Ideas?

 

[JLDickmon]

pull the codes...

 

[jopes]

will any OBD II code scanner work or do I need a diesel specific one to read them?

 

[DaveBen]

There are only a few scanners/readers that will read the Ford CAN code communications protocol. Auto Enginuity and Auto Xray are two of them. I have and Autoxray 3000 and it works great. Auto Enginuity makes a spoftware program that you can use on a laptop that does a great job.

Dave

 

[jopes]

Thank You DaveBen for coming over tonight! Scanned the system no codes present.

Ideas now?

 

[JLDickmon]

Was the light flashing at regular intervals, or was it flickering on & off?

 

[DaveBen]

You are most welcome jopes. Nice truck you got there. Hope you find out what your problem is.

Dave

 

[JLDickmon]

Dave... did you go VIN specific or OBD-II generic?

I'm almost bettin' it's got an injector not switching low-to-high... possible loose connection (spade to post, not loose connector)...

 

[jopes]

it would flash just enought to catch your eye then go right back off. Engine was running completely fine, no misses, no loss of power. This has not happened once since I unloaded the truck. Been driving fine all week now.

if it was a injector not switching wouldn't I be feeling a miss of some sort?

 

[JLDickmon]

no, not necessarily...

it's still gonna squirt, just the dwell time is different...

like I said, if you got an injector failed on a PSD, you wont be able to see out of the rearview mirror..

fail two, the mirror falls off the windshield