I am possibly interested in a bucket truck that has a vt365 in it it has 9,000 PTO hours 17,000 engine hours and 97,000 miles on the truck. How many engine hours do these typically get before they either blow up or need to be rebuilt does anybody know? Thank you
That's a 6.0 power stroke, out of the box it's not a good engine but upgraded it's a very good engine with a few small worts. That's a ton of hours on that engine, in comparison my truck has 262,000 miles and around 7000 hours. 1 hour of idling equals 25 miles of use. I would guess that engine is like a pickup with 500k on it. The biggest problem with the 6.0 is lack of oil maintenance and the heui fuel system needs good oil. I would think with all the use either they have been taking care of it really well or it already has had a long block in it.
Probably the worst ever, mass produced, modern engine failure of our time. B10 rating of like 40,000 miles. Nothing but Pain, heartache, lawsuits and suffering.
Could be worse, could be a 6.4. But I don't know how the 6.0 performed in an International, nobody around here ran those, or the 7.3, in an International truck. It was always the 466 or 530/570 here.
Many VT365’s ended up in school busses. Like the vast majority. Asplundh tree trucks, utility trucks and municipal contracts. The 6.4 was a mess, but certainly didn’t create as much legal issues as the 6.0. Such as the largest buy back in Ford history. But, we made big money fixing them, the aftermarket and specialty shops. Don’t forget the great memes. Bless the 6.0 and place your tow mirrors at half mast for the fallen. .
Even worse than the 8.2L Detroit Diesel "Fuel Pincher"? Thats real bad!
It's a bucket truck with approximately 9,000 PTO hours
Different era and hard to say, but the 6.0 can be beefed up to actually work, and will be supported by the aftermarket for years to come, some people still like them. The 8.2 is pretty much orphaned now and nobody ever liked them, they were awful to drive from day 1.
Yes and I knowing what I know (6.0 Ford pickups) to give you an answer. 9000 pto hours is equivalent to over 250,000 miles. The remaining 8000 engine hours is extremely high idle time for 100k miles. I would be more concerned of the high engine hours to milage then the PTO hours since PTO is a high idle and much better on the engine then idling. See if they have records on changing oil and/or see how often they did it, if they changed oil off of hours and did it around 250 hours it's probably a good engine. Make sure it's a OEM oil filter cap and not a tall aftermarket cap lat like to bypass oil and not have it filtered. Oem fuel filters only help a huge amount as well. See what injectors are in the engine and if they went with OEM. The ficm needs to be OEM as well. Basically if they are using any aftermarket parts it's a red flag as they fail early and often.
After putting some time and money in my 6.0 I'll put it up against any other engine. They only real things "wrong" with the engine is you can't pull the cam before the crank, two oil connections under the head that don't go bad, the small factory alternator and battery wires, and almost anything aftermarket part (with a few exceptions). There are a small amount of other rare things that happen to any other diesel pickup engine as well. The heui system is really good and gives a lot of power but must be kept clean.
Is there any way you can get the service and maintenance records for the truck? The PTO hours are probably 90% idle time as well. The bucket trucks I worked on the only time the engine speed would increase when the PTO was in and the hydraulics were engaged otherwise the engine would drop back to idle. So around 16000 hours idle time.
just say no, and keep looking. 6 in a row is the way to go.
Bottom line is, this is a piece of equipment and the engine is only part of the equation. I always figure an engine of this type to be zero time left at 20k hours. Plus you have a known problematic engine. So just run a business plan, figuring a major engine rebuild/upgrade will be necessary immediately. If that does not pencil out, walk. I would make the seller aware of your numbers. They may want to unload it anyway. If you are able to use it for a time before the inevitable rebuild, free money.
That's the way to look at it.^ If you want to wrench, it's a sound plan. If you want to get to work it's a big gamble.
If you minus the PTO time from total hours, you have a 8000 hour engine with 100k miles, that is way over a normal amount of a ratio. My pickup has 262k and 6000 hours. That engine has been idle probably 2-3 times than it should have been which is not good. We are also assuming it's the original engine, I doubt it, 6.0s do not go good in work trucks where nobody cares and leaves them idling all day.
^ the above is why it's a bad idea to get a truck that was working the oil sands in the Dakotas. They were left to idle much of the time and that just carbons them up.
Yeah, the 8.2. Funny, that monstrosity came to mind. But, that’s from a different place & different time. Even before the OEM’s had B10 & B50 ratings. I actually worked on one the other day in a semi-retired, ultra-low mile, Ford F-series fire tender being used as a water truck at a construction company as standby when burning stump piles.
There is one engine left out of this discussion-the most disliked, hated, gutless, troublesome I know of------------9.0L international V8.
Any aerial rig is going to be high pto idle hours, if it was really worked of course, if it's upfit with lights, inverter, radio/computer the regular idle time will be up there too. I'd be more worried about the shape of the body and boom. Knowing what new trucks and aerial bodies run these days and the lead time if the truck fits your needs and the boom and body are nice and it can be had for a good price you can always overhaul or swap the engine.