Cranks, won't fire

[suv7734]

Maybe a dumb question but how full is the fuel tank? If it's reading less than 1/2 full and the pick-up in the tank is broken you may be running out of fuel.

 

[mac]

Maybe a dumb question but how full is the fuel tank? If it's reading less than 1/2 full and the pick-up in the tank is broken you may be running out of fuel.

Lol yeah that was my first thought, I tried both tanks (one was 100% full, the other should have been around 80%) and there was no effect.

Just got home from the parts store with some diesel clean, and new air and fuel filters. One of my buds at the parts store used to be a diesel tech, he thinks its just the fuel filter gettin gummed up . Well, time to go give it a shot, and check out that solenoid too.

 

[Goofyexponent]

let us know! Hopefully that is all it was.

 

[f-two-fiddy]

What was the fuel level in the tank when You started having this problem? If it was a 1/4 or below. I'd suspect that the fuel pickup fell off, and You were sucking air.

 

[mac]

What was the fuel level in the tank when You started having this problem? If it was a 1/4 or below. I'd suspect that the fuel pickup fell off, and You were sucking air.

I think it was a little over 3/4.

Got the new fuel filter on, filled it with some Diesel Klean, put the new air filter on, charged the batteries. No progress.
With the new stuff, it'd fire once or twice and that'd be it. I tried it with the air box completely open, and with some ether too, and it was firing a little easier but still wouldn't stay running It cranks over, and we tried it until the batteries were dead, but now I'm back to square 1

 

[Compu Doc]

How much fuel was in the fuel filter when you took it off?. Did you check the fuel pump and check the oil dipstick for the smell of diesel?.

 

[mac]

Fuel filter was full when I took it off, didn't check the oil for diesel but I checked the diesel for oil. Sorta.
I called up my bud who used to be a diesel tech and he came over and checked it out. He checked through the fuel system and it was black, seems to be coming from the rear tank cause the front tanks wasn't nearly as dirty. I don't think the PO ever actually used the rear tank, and when I filled/switched the tanks to the rear it must've let all hell loose and gummed everything up. He said that from the color of the fuel in the rear tank, it looked to be 50/50 diesel and oil, or some other contaminant. Also found that injectors #3 on the pass side and #4 on the driver side are leaking, but since they're leaking on top and not in the cylinder its probably just the seals, possibly blown out by the bad fuel.
So, the plan now is to pop off the new filter, dump the black out and put the filter back on, switch to tank #1 and turn the pump on for 30 seconds, remove/dump/replace filter and repeat until I get clean diesel coming through, then crank it until the bad fuel is out of the injectors and see if it fires.
I'll worry about the dirty tank later, I can run it on the front one till I get around to cleaning the rear one. Hopefully the 2 leaking injectors aren't bad enough that there won't be enough pressure to run the engine... getting it running is my first priority, then I'll worry about getting it running well.

 

[Compu Doc]

The black might also be some kind of algae since the rear tank was hardly used by the PO. When you said turn the fuel pump on I am assuming that it has an electric pump. In that case I would take the filter off and just run the pump holding a container to catch the bad diesel until it runs clear. When the container is full shut the pump off and repeat until it runs clear. That would save the filter from being plugged up. Then install a new filter filled with fresh diesel and a diesel fuel cleaner so that when it does start it will clean out the rest of the junk.

 

[mac]

The black might also be some kind of algae since the rear tank was hardly used by the PO. When you said turn the fuel pump on I am assuming that it has an electric pump. In that case I would take the filter off and just run the pump holding a container to catch the bad diesel until it runs clear. When the container is full shut the pump off and repeat until it runs clear. That would save the filter from being plugged up. Then install a new filter filled with fresh diesel and a diesel fuel cleaner so that when it does start it will clean out the rest of the junk.

Hmm... interesting theory. I had no idea that diesel could grow algae.
Yes, electric pump wired up to a toggle in the cab.
What I ended up doing was removing the filter and putting a funnel in its place with a line running down to the bottom of the truck into a bucket. I switched the fuel pump on and turned it to the front tank, and for some reason it came out black too. I drained out the entire front tank that way, all of it was black as night, and by that time it had gotten dark, so that was the end of today. I talked to by buddy that was a diesel mechanic, and he's supposed to come over tomorrow afternoon and see if he can get the damn thing runnin again. The way I see it, if he can get it running I'll owe him a few rounds, and if he can't then I'm SOL anyway.
I can put together a gas burnin engine just fine, but this diesel is makin me feel like an idiot.

 

[Agnem]

Diesel is somewhat famous for supporting life. However, that kind of black sounds like waste motor oil.

 

[mac]

Well, fixed it.
After having the fawker towed home and spending a good 6 hours running through things and working on it... a wire was loose. One single wire.


Ah well, now I get to go mount my new wheels/tires.

 

[dyoung14]

what wire

 

[mac]

what wire

Uh... the red one that lit up my test light when the key was on
I'm pretty sure its the injector pump power or something along those lines.

I pretty much looked at the engine, found a part with wires coming out of it that weren't hooked up to anything, then I looked around for a hot wire nearby and found one, and put em together to see if it would work. It fired and ran, and I let it warm up and disconnected the wire and it killed it... so I figured I found the problem lol.

 

[argve]

oh man don't ya just hate it when it's the simple stuff that gets ya.... been there done that. Good to hear that ya got her fixed... Sounds like it was the power control wire for the Fuel Shut Off Solenoid because that is really the only wire the engine needs to be told to start and run. If I remember correctly it's a red wire with a green stripe.

 

[mac]

Yup, sounds like that was probably the one... don't remember any green in the thing but then its mostly black from oil so it could have the stripe. Either way, it runs
Oh and the black in the fuel... the PO had the thing running on used motor oil out of a huge tank takin up half the bed, turns out he filled the actual tanks with the crap too. It burns it, so I'll just keep fillin em with diesel and eventually it'll be diluted out.

Next up: find real lugnuts so I can mount the new meats, find some tire chains, replace PS pump (leaking and causing fluid to turn cloudy ), find and stop oil leak, convert to 7.3 GP system so I don't need ether for cold starts, make some stacks/fix exhaust leak, buy new clutch, look into serpentine belt conversion, look into propane injection, sell house and find a nice cozy box so I can afford all this...