Is idling bad?

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RPG9

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My Raptor idles a lot (all my vehicles do). I drove 3k miles for a cross country trip earlier in the year: my truck drove all day and was left on each night as I slept in it. Never had a smoke issue or anything else—was also hauling an 18ft trailer mind you. Run a premium full synthetic oil and change it often if you are concerned with excessive idling since idling does cause your oil to wear out sooner. Moreover, use top tier fuel in your vehicle to ensure it functions properly. Bad fuel can cause rough idling, engine knocking, and so on.
 

CodeOrangeGen3

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As someone who has to make sure a fleet gets maintained, I can assure you excessive idle time is rough on them, Ford says every idle hour is equivalent to 30 miles, we have 65k mile cars in our fleet with 18-20k of idle time, I can assure you that they are smoking piles of $h!t.

A neighboring department had a fleet of ecoboost car that would eat turbos every 10-12 months, one again, hot seating the cars and excessive idle time. If leaving them idling was good, dealers would just leave them run on the lot?

Ford did void a warranty on one of our F550’s, the truck had 9k miles on it, but had 1k idle time on it, motor gave up, and even though Ford fleet said that they would never use idle hours to void a warranty....... they did. Your mileage may vary....
Curious as to why they would offer the generators on these trucks if you shouldn’t idle for extended periods. I plan to use mine for camping so it won’t get a ton of use but definitely plan on idling more than any other vehicle I have owned. Assuming they would warranty if you have the generator?
 

WestTXRaptor6

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I was the original OP of the White Smoke thread. I have a 2021 Raptor on order and it will be my 6th Raptor. Prior I had 2013, 2014, 2017, 2019, 2020. I am in the oil business and regularly sit on location for 12+ hours with the trucks idling. All 3 second gen trucks would smoke like a mosquito fogger if I idled more that an hour or so. I stopped using them for work and now use my Super Duties for that purpose. Just sucks because these lease roads are so bad, no matter what I spend with Icon on these suspensions, the big trucks beat me up. Raptors take these roads so much better. The 2021 will sit at home like the 2020 did for most of its life.
 

jabroni619

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As someone who has to make sure a fleet gets maintained, I can assure you excessive idle time is rough on them, Ford says every idle hour is equivalent to 30 miles, we have 65k mile cars in our fleet with 18-20k of idle time, I can assure you that they are smoking piles of $h!t.

A neighboring department had a fleet of ecoboost car that would eat turbos every 10-12 months, one again, hot seating the cars and excessive idle time. If leaving them idling was good, dealers would just leave them run on the lot?

Ford did void a warranty on one of our F550’s, the truck had 9k miles on it, but had 1k idle time on it, motor gave up, and even though Ford fleet said that they would never use idle hours to void a warranty....... they did. Your mileage may vary....
The question isn’t, “is idling good” it’s, “is idling bad?” So the example you used about cars on dealer lots is a little retarded.
 

RPG9

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I was the original OP of the White Smoke thread. I have a 2021 Raptor on order and it will be my 6th Raptor. Prior I had 2013, 2014, 2017, 2019, 2020. I am in the oil business and regularly sit on location for 12+ hours with the trucks idling. All 3 second gen trucks would smoke like a mosquito fogger if I idled more that an hour or so. I stopped using them for work and now use my Super Duties for that purpose. Just sucks because these lease roads are so bad, no matter what I spend with Icon on these suspensions, the big trucks beat me up. Raptors take these roads so much better. The 2021 will sit at home like the 2020 did for most of its life.
My Gen 3 will be my 5th Raptor—not too many people have me beat on that sir :)

What type of oil and fuel do you use? Yesterday, I left my truck idling as I went into Costco and a meat butcher shop. Was easily an hour plus of idle time and had no issue. My Gen 2 is a 2020.

Have you tried a Carli suspension for your Super Duties? I have been looking at a F350 Tremor and doing a full Carli build. Have heard great things about the 10 speed with the 6.7 Powerstroke. It won’t be a Raptor, but it’s the most capable set up that you can have on a SD.
 
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WestTXRaptor6

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I have always used Mobil 1 and premium fuel. There is a ton of folks on that old thread that had same issues so I know it is not related to oil or fuel..also have one employee with a 2019 and his smokes as well.

On the Superduties, I have never tried Carli, but hear good things. Icon has always done me well, just these roads are pretty bad. My tech gets me a very good deal on the Icons so we run them on all our service trucks and have had very few failures.
 

WTX

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I’ve had Carli setups on two pickups. 2016 f-350 SRW LB with a back country kit and a 2019 f-250 SB with a pin top kit with carli add a pack in the rear. Total game changer on lease roads and at the ranch.

I sold my ‘19 a month ago and regret it. Oh well, we’ll see how the gen 3 raptor does.
 

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K223

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So what’s contributing to the smoking? Bearing seals on the turbos? I can’t imagine it’s the motor itself in this day and age. I would have imagined Ford endurance testing accounted for this?

I remember the days when you shouldn’t let some particular small blocks idle long as the cam lobes weren’t pressure oiled, or some motor’s will burn up the valve seals and even lower tension rings would let a lot of blow by through.
 
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