the Ford eco diesel uses a rubber timing belt... sounds insane to me. I know the first year ram ecodiesel had some problems. Mostly emission crap. A couple guys I know run them and love it. But you can get a 3/4 Cummins cheaper most of the time. Mind boggling to me.
Ford...eco diesel? You mean ecoboost?
I saw 2 things with the ecodiesel: the "cam gear slip" and some tossed rods. The rods were supposedly traced back to cross threaded con-rod bolts at the factory (
Fix
It
Again
Tony).
The cam sprocket bolt has a TSB, and most of the hype from that seemed to come from one person who had done youtube videos about it and a magical diesel shop in Utah that could "fix" the issues before they went. The videos failed to mention anything about what was fixed...and it seemed very deliberate in its' vagueness. He had a large number of critics to say the least, and had also been banned from some Dodge forums for whatever reason. His truck had like 140,000 miles when the cam thing happened, and was nearing 200,000 before he took his own life. Just a sad thing.
The rest, as you said, seems like normal diesel stuff to me.
But your point about price is well taken; That 3.0 is a COMPLEX little engine that can't be cheap to build. Maybe
@CumminsPusher should be our guide and all go 12v.