Grey smoke and lumpy warm starts... again

There seems to be quite a lot of speak about this problem, of shaky warm starts..
We've had our 2004 Freelander TD4 now for 5 yrs and so far has been as good as gold, but its started this lumpy start with grey /white smoke when starting from warm.
First thing on a cold morning with the glow plugs it is fine, just a little puff, a hot engine after 10 mins is fine, but this afternoon after 4 hours it took a little starting followed by a huge cloud of grey smoke, but settled down and ran fine. It turned over quickly with the starter motor, firing occasionally, then caught after about 10 secs.
Its been having this smoke issue for a couple of years but never no trouble to start, and was always better during the winter when it used the glow plugs.

From what I can gather this problem is quite well known, but I can't seem to find a cure. So far I've removed the EGR, fitted BMW vortex breather, replaced coolant temp sensor, full service numerous times with all filters, checked glow plugs, injector leak back is / was fine, tried different fuels and Millers eco power plus treatments but to no avail..

Has anyone found a cure for this, are there any problems known of about stretch in the timing chain throwing the valve timing slightly? Or soot and gunge from the EGR around the valves causing poor compression until it all settles down?

Can't seem to find many reports of this engine and problem in the BMW's, it runs fine and during the summer it gave us nearly 43mpg, with the aircon on too!! so there cant be too much seriously wrong..I hope.

Hoping someone can shed some light??

Cheers,

Mark
Freelander TD4 SE 2004

is you maf clean, do you do just town runs, if so you need to give it a good run this ws the advise of LR dealer my freelander has stoped giving clouds of grey smoke since i started to give it longer runs , BUT I am going to clean out the maf ,also LR did say it was coman .but you also have the shaky starts that could also be attributed to the maf if it is on its way out

"Has anyone found a cure for this, are there any problems known of about stretch in the timing chain throwing the valve timing slightly? Or soot and gunge from the EGR around the valves causing poor compression until it all settles down?"

chains will not stretch, and the valves will be spotless, ,,,it could be a fuel pump failing ?

try turning the ignition on and wait for at least 5 seconds, before cranking, it gives the fuel pump time to pressurise the fuel rail and the glow plugs time to heat,

john t said:

try turning the ignition on and wait for at least 5 seconds, before cranking, it gives the fuel pump time to pressurise the fuel rail and the glow plugs time to heat,

Click to expand...

This is a good idea.

Also don't buy supermarket fuel.

Singvogel.

Cheers guys,

I do use Total in the local Rainbow, or Jet from the Ford garage.. not sure what either of those two are like.
The MAF is nearly two years old, and is the Pierburg unit and Synergy tuning box from Ron at tuning diesels, I don't think there was too much wrong with the original MAF, maybe I'll put the car back to standard and see how it goes..

I did have the fuel pump pack up about 4 years ago, it wouldn't start end off and threw up a management light on the dash, is it possible the pump isn't quite giving the required pressure, but high enough to keep the pressure sensor happy?? But the thing that puzzles me is that it is only when the engine is warm. During the winter when it uses the glow plugs from cold it isn't too bad, and when hot it is fine.
I did wonder if one of the injectors is leaking fuel into a cylinder when it sits.. but there is no black smoke when starting from hot suggesting a rich cylinder.
I have tried waiting for the fuel pump for 5 - 10 secs, but doesn't seem to make too much difference. The one thing I will try is manually heating the glow plugs with a warm engine then starting it immediatly, I'll let you all know what happens.. all seems like poor combustion, as you guys said, sh!t fuel, and the fact it only goes 10 miles at the most then back again at the mo, it did have a run of 250 miles with a horse trailer on last year, but didn't make any difference at the time..
I've got some ADD-IT+ fuel treatment here, I'll put that in with a tank of BP's finest and use that for a while and see if things improve..

Cheers guys, any more advise more than welcome..