My name is Scott I’m from Oxford, AL and my friend has a 1997 Ford F-250 diesel, automatic transmission, 7.3l power stroke with 330,000 miles on it my question is a while back it was making a horrible noise only way I can describe it is like an engine knock but it didn’t exactly sound like metal on metal to me, more like the torque converter was loose, we checked all the torque converter bolts they were all tight, so I did a little research online and several people mentioned the flex plates break around the bolts holding it to the crank, we stuck a screw driver in there and turned the front of the motor and it didn’t stay still so if it’s cracked it’s not cracked completely around those bolts but here’s where it gets kinda strange it stopped cranking it just clicked so we took the starter off and the little gear was all floppy and had play back and forth, we replaced the starter and it hasn’t made that noise since and it’s been several months and he does drive it regularly, so my question is, if the starter having play like that could have cause the noise or is something out of balance in the rotating assembly of the crank and that’s what caused the starter to have play?
Truck is a 24 year old diesel with 330k miles. Starter if still the original, probably was having trouble turning the engine over and began failing and wearing out. 24 years of turning over that big diesel decided to call it quits. Since the noise is gone, good indication that it was the culprit.
