2002 detroit 60 series shut down and will now only start with starting fluid.

That’s what my husband is doing today.

 

That’s what my husband is doing today replacing his ecm today in another truck to see if that’s the problem.

 

Yry that today and it didn’t work

 

Transferring a engine computer module to one engine or another presents a whole set of issues.

We once considered replacing the entire computer inside our little tahoe because it wont match the fuel mixture to get it cranking. We discovered it was recieving bad information from the coolant sensor that claimed the fluid was at -5 after sitting overnight inside a 60 degree shop. Bingo. New coolant sensor put in, computer knew then what mixture to make and cranks.

If we had to replace that computer, we could do it, but it would have required a special operation called a flash. That is literally a software rewrite to a certain degree of very basic knowledge it will require when it wakes up inside a new vehicle and assumes work. The human equivilant would be your heart beat time and breathing systems that';s in your brain stem. If you don't have that information, nothing above will work at all. (You are dead)

Most big trucks when they get sick and wont start up properly, they USUALLY with a good shop and a correct diagnosis process wherever it leads to will find the root cause of the problem and fix it for the next however many years.

I hate to be difficult but these new computer trucks, they usually retain or throw a specific code. If you can pull it and know what it's telling you wrong then that's what you focus on. The older iron you can do all sorts of things to kick em alive and ready to work. But those days are gone forever.

I have had trucks in the 90's with the early ECM's that were completely dead. All you needed to do was shut the engine off (Which I never did in those days.) If I had shut it off to go dinner, guess what. Next call would be a heavy wrecker to get it back to the shop. One expensive dinner.

They took it into the shop, shut it off and proceeded to do some work I had written up for it and she did not start again. They followed the diagnosis tree far enough up until realizing the entire computer brain is kaput. 2000 dollars and two days later I had a truck with a new brain. And not a very happy shop. Heh. But they are the ones that shut it off. Not me.