Ol' Smokey

Right, I've finished rebuilding my Series III and now getting down to getting it through the MOT.

Couple of known things left (if you're interested) a brake light has stopped working again (simple fix) and new tyres are required (some Mud Terrains on order).

The only thing I'm not too sure about for the MOT is that there's quite a bit of smoke, particularly on acceleration. I know the black smoke on acceleration is probably air-filter (haven't cleaned, checked or done anything to it so will do that once I've finished typing this). However the white smoke is a bit more puzzling:

When started (particularly now in the cold of West Wales [well warm compared to London]) there's almost no smoke. After a few minutes when the engine begins to warm up there's a noticeable amount of white smoke being emitted.

Any ideas on what's causing this? There's a whole new set of injectors on her (2.25 diesel) so I doubt it's that. The fact that it seems to get worse when it warms up hints at burning oil but it doesn't smell like it. However I have not checked anything like piston rings etc.

As far as I can tell there's no (major) air in the system. I know that the overflow pipe from the rear-most injector has a slit in it so spills a little diesel when running (have taped it up until I can get it repaired or another one ).

The fuel tank was sitting out of the vehicle for months before it went back in so there's a chance there's water in the diesel, could that cause the white smoke?

Basically any ideas on what order I should check things, or the order in which I'm going to locate the problem more quickly?

(There isn't a huge amount of smoke but it's more than should be there, even for a Landy).

Hope you all had a good Christmas.

Ed

If the white smoke disappears after a good run, then it is probably just condensation in the exhaust system. If it was water in the fuel, it would be running a bit rough. Has the coolant level gone down at all? (Head gasket)

Worf said:

If the white smoke disappears after a good run, then it is probably just condensation in the exhaust system. If it was water in the fuel, it would be running a bit rough. Has the coolant level gone down at all? (Head gasket)

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Haven't really given it a good run (finished it and then went straight back up to London). I've taken a sample from the fuel tank into a jam jar and left it to settle to see if there's any water in it but it's not running rough.

Coolant levels haven't gone down as far as I know (last time I checked).

I did clean and replace the oil in the air filter and that seems to have reduced the smoke density a moderate amount. Still thickish black smoke on hard acceleration (how much is normal?) though.

If the ground freezes up tomorrow night then I'll take it out for a spin in the fields (don't want to rip them up too much).

There have been a couple of threads on here recently regarding smokey 2.25 diesels:

http://www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/f6/2-25-diesel-smoking-bad-65034.html

http://www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/f6/sm...-help-me-i-am-going-mad-67717.html#post651551

I'd try advancing the timing, it sorted the smoking problem on mine. If you're unluky it might be an internal problem with the fuel injection pump. The owner of Minster Diesel in Haverfordwest is an expert on Land-Rover 2.25 fuel pumps as he used to recondition them for Lucas. Give us a shout if you want to put a few more dents in your Landy out on the greenlanes of Wales, when you've got the MOT - I'm in West Wales too

fenby1976 said:

There have been a couple of threads on here recently regarding smokey 2.25 diesels:

http://www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/f6/2-25-diesel-smoking-bad-65034.html

http://www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/f6/sm...-help-me-i-am-going-mad-67717.html#post651551

I'd try advancing the timing, it sorted the smoking problem on mine. If you're unluky it might be an internal problem with the fuel injection pump. The owner of Minster Diesel in Haverfordwest is an expert on Land-Rover 2.25 fuel pumps as he used to recondition them for Lucas. Give us a shout if you want to put a few more dents in your Landy out on the greenlanes of Wales, when you've got the MOT - I'm in West Wales too

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I had thought about timing but wanted to eliminate other possibilities first before getting fiddly. I might take it for an MOT first and see whether there is in fact too much smoke.

Hmmm, might have to pay Minster a visit, he's just down the road from a friend of mine (Andy Owen who runs Haylett Grange Shooting Supplies).

The smoke is very likely to be caused by retarded fuel pump timing - these engines are notorious for it. It's very easy to advance the timing:

1. Mark the position of the pump (so you know where to put the timing back to if the adjustments don't make an improvement).

2. Slacken off all the unions of the pipes running from the fuel pump to the injectors.

3. Slacken off the three nuts securing the pump to the block.

4. Rotate the pump clockwise a bit.

5. Tighten everything back up again.

You'll know if you've advanced the timing too far because the engine will make more of a dieselish knocking noise when you rev it up. Just adust the timing to find a balance between smoke and knocking. I got mine set up nicely in about 3/4 of an hour.

fenby1976 said:

The smoke is very likely to be caused by retarded fuel pump timing - these engines are notorious for it. It's very easy to advance the timing:

1. Mark the position of the pump (so you know where to put the timing back to if the adjustments don't make an improvement).

2. Slacken off all the unions of the pipes running from the fuel pump to the injectors.

3. Slacken off the three nuts securing the pump to the block.

4. Rotate the pump clockwise a bit.

5. Tighten everything back up again.

You'll know if you've advanced the timing too far because the engine will make more of a dieselish knocking noise when you rev it up. Just adust the timing to find a balance between smoke and knocking. I got mine set up nicely in about 3/4 of an hour.

Click to expand...

Hmmm, that was a much nicer explanation that Haynes. Out of curiosity (I'm guessing it will) is this likely to fix the black smoke on acceleration? Since black => too much fuel I would think so.

I'm not too sure if it will reduce the black smoke. The problem with mine was blue/white smoke, which was particularly bad at idle, and a slight missfire. The instructions in my last post are those given to me by the owner of Minster Diesel - he advised me that once the engine is a bit worn, following the official procedure for setting the timing will be a wasted effort. Giving the engine a very hard run just before the MOT will help with the emmisions test.

Doesn't blue smoke imply burning oil? White is either water or timing, black is unburnt fuel. At least that's what I've gathered.

I'll play with the timing if I get a chance tomorrow (going up Newport way for shooting).

Blue smoke often does point to engine oil being burnt, but I think that bad timing can produce black, blue and white smoke. I'm afraid I have no idea why bad timing can produce different coloured smoke though. If blue smoke pours out of the dipstick pipe when you pull the dipstick out with the engine running then the blue smoke from the exhaust pipe is likely to be due to worn bores and piston rings. A compression test can confirm that.