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A farmer in Nebraska taught me more about injectors than 5 years of school
Last fall I was out near Grand Island doing a mobile call on an old 7.3 Powerstroke. This guy, Carl, maybe 70 years old, watched me pull the valve covers for like 20 minutes. Then he just says 'you're chasing the wrong cylinder.' I asked how he knew that without a scanner. He pointed at the fuel return line and said the pulse felt off on number 3. I checked it with my hand. Damn if he wasn't right. Burnt up injector. We swapped it in his dirt floor shed using a ratchet strap as a spring compressor. He charged me 12 dollars in parts and a story about a 1974 combine. Anyone else ever had an old timer just nail a diagnosis by feel? Makes me wonder if I rely too much on electronics.
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josephjohnson22d ago
How do you know he wasn't just lucky though? I've seen old guys guess right once and then be wrong ten times after that, and nobody remembers the wrong calls. Feeling a return line pulse is a neat trick but it only tells you something is off, not what or why. A scanner would've shown you the balance rates and saved you the guessing game. I'll take the old timer's tips and the laptop both, but I'm not ditching the electronics over one good call in a shed.
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