I need your help. I have had this truck for a little over a year. It has a leaking IP and dribbling injectors based on valley pan and white puff of acrid fuel smelling smoke on startups. It is a work truck so it goes to work just about every day with a trailer load of something. I recently put a plow on it and had some action Wednesday night. Noticed a knock that is usually not quite so loud. It is loudest under passenger side near starter / forward of the oil pan. I check oil semi regular because it doesn't usually burn a lot. Twice a month sometimes more. Two snow storms this weekend so I wanted to inspect the truck. Realized that I hadn't checked the SCA's since I owned the truck so I bought test strips. Figured I'd change oil and do a coolant flush and start fresh.
One more note here... after the night of plowing everything was normal except the loud knock which is intermittent and sometimes non existent on startups. RDT had it's unmistakable stank and the fuel smell. So, check coolant and I can see fins and no coolant. Overflow is 1/3 or more full. I had an idea from past experience there may be a bad rad cap involved. ANYWAY topped off coolant without thinking I just made the test strips pointless. Pull truck in last night, drain oil and I get 2 or 3 quarts..... Uh-oh. Drain coolant from rad, 2 block plugs. So I noticed a couple things.... lower hose on rad and fluid inside are not hot after driving truck to local diesel provider. Rad is very hot. Upper hose is very hot and fluid in top of rad steaming. Heat in cab is good.
After flush with distilled and prestone I drained it out same as before and added coolant. Got 6.5 gallons in less than normal 8. Oil was already filled, new filter, etc. Found crack in coolant overflow and the new rad cap created vacuum pressure so I thought I solved the low coolant at least. Start up truck and immediately smell coolant. Uh-oh. Burning off the crossover pipe? Nope. The normal stinky choo choo train puff from the RDT is now the choo choo puff of hot coolant. Knock has not gone away. Truck runs like **** and the coolant smell is very strong and very noticeable with window down. Also, when I pulled oil pan plug it had a half inch tall magnetized tower of metal shavings. Thanks to those that have taken the time to read this far.
One more note here... after the night of plowing everything was normal except the loud knock which is intermittent and sometimes non existent on startups. RDT had it's unmistakable stank and the fuel smell. So, check coolant and I can see fins and no coolant. Overflow is 1/3 or more full. I had an idea from past experience there may be a bad rad cap involved. ANYWAY topped off coolant without thinking I just made the test strips pointless. Pull truck in last night, drain oil and I get 2 or 3 quarts..... Uh-oh. Drain coolant from rad, 2 block plugs. So I noticed a couple things.... lower hose on rad and fluid inside are not hot after driving truck to local diesel provider. Rad is very hot. Upper hose is very hot and fluid in top of rad steaming. Heat in cab is good.
After flush with distilled and prestone I drained it out same as before and added coolant. Got 6.5 gallons in less than normal 8. Oil was already filled, new filter, etc. Found crack in coolant overflow and the new rad cap created vacuum pressure so I thought I solved the low coolant at least. Start up truck and immediately smell coolant. Uh-oh. Burning off the crossover pipe? Nope. The normal stinky choo choo train puff from the RDT is now the choo choo puff of hot coolant. Knock has not gone away. Truck runs like **** and the coolant smell is very strong and very noticeable with window down. Also, when I pulled oil pan plug it had a half inch tall magnetized tower of metal shavings. Thanks to those that have taken the time to read this far.