smoke, smoke and more smoke!

got a 110, 86, 2.5 td and its smokeing, and i have searched and searched on the forums and found many situations that are similar to mine! again i have changed the oil, oil filter, heater plugs the things that are easy and to an extent that has worked, on start and at low revs no smoke really, but open it up and blue smoke bellows! it misfires on startup, not badly, but u feel the judder and see the smoke, like one cylinder is struggling every 5 or ten seconds randomly! the warmer it gets the more normal it becomes, except when you put the foot down and the blue arrives! from all your informative posts i blame the injection pump but im probably wrong, any help is appreciated! ive heard a reconditioned injector pump can cost 400 quid...that isnt good...

Do a compression test and see if a pot is low compression my guess broken ring or worn valve guide. good luck chap...

Have you changed the fuel filter, may have water in it.

GIROGUY said:

got a 110, 86, 2.5 td and its smokeing, and i have searched and searched on the forums and found many situations that are similar to mine! again i have changed the oil, oil filter, heater plugs the things that are easy and to an extent that has worked, on start and at low revs no smoke really, but open it up and blue smoke bellows! it misfires on startup, not badly, but u feel the judder and see the smoke, like one cylinder is struggling every 5 or ten seconds randomly! the warmer it gets the more normal it becomes, except when you put the foot down and the blue arrives! from all your informative posts i blame the injection pump but im probably wrong, any help is appreciated! ive heard a reconditioned injector pump can cost 400 quid...that isnt good...

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Betcha if you smell the smoke it aint oil it's fuel, coz I fink yer pump timing has gone out. Check fred "white smoke".

Blue smoke with a 2.5TD engine is not really a good sign no matter how you look at it because these engines are notoriously troublesome (especially the earlier versions). Problems such as cracked pistons and in some cases even cracked blocks would cause excessive crankcase pressure and force the engine to burn its own oil. Later models had a better designed (possibly thicker?) block with a better water jacket which almost solved these problems primarily caused by overheating.

No matter how you look at it, you are going to need to take the head off your engine to get a really good diagnoses of the problem. Whether or not you want to do this yourself or pay a garage to do it for you is entirely down to you, but I will walk you through everything that you need to know in order to diagnose and repair your engine, if it is in fact a problems being caused below the cylinder head.

Here's a quick test you can try:

1) Start the engine and get it up to temperature
2) Remove the oil level dipstick
3) Press your thumb over the tube for about 5 seconds
4) Remove your thumb quickly

Is there a lot of pressure build up, or does it absolutely launch oil out at you? If this is the case, you are looking at excessive crank case pressure.
The choice is down to you at this point. You can either pay a garage a lot of money to take your engine apart, or you can save yourself £400-£600 doing it yourself and it is really easy.

If you decide to take your engine apart yourself, here's a quick guide to get you going:

What you will need:

Tools:
1) Empty cardboard box / sections to make a component tidy
2) Socket set
3) Flat head screwdriver with long blade
4) Container for engine oil

New Parts:
1) Genuine cylinder head gasket
2) Rocker cover gasket
3) Engine oil
4) Anti freeze

Depending on whether or not you find the problem and the faulty parts, there will be extra components to buy, none of which are overly expensive, BUT it could prove worthwhile, and actually cheaper to buy an old 200tdi engine and transplant it into your Defender, selling your old TD, or refurbishing it and then selling it for example.

The Process:

1) Disconnect the radiator pipes at the junction between the short pipe leaving the radiator, the long pipe which joins the engine / water pump and the long pipe which connects to the water reservoir / expansion tank, and allow all the coolant to drain.

2) Remove the fan cowling and any retaining nuts / bolts.

3) Drain one to two litres of your engine oil and save to filter and re-use.

4) Remove the wire assembly across the glow plugs (there is no need to remove the glow plugs however).

5) Remove each injector so that you can get to some of the headbolts. If they refuse to just pull out, gently prise them with the scew driver.

6) Remove the rocker cover.

7) Remove the rocker shaft (one complete assembly), and keep the bolts organised in a card tidy, they need to back in the same order.

8) Remove all eight pushrods and store them in order (they just slide out), checking that none of them are bent.

9) Remove the air intake / exhaust manifold.

10) Disconnect the oil return pipe on the drivers side of the head which is positioned almost against the bulkhead, just below the fuel filter housing.

11) Remove each headbolt and keep in order.

The head is now ready to be lifted off the engine block. There is no need for you to remove the fan or water pump or any other components, and you are now more than half way through dismantling your engine.

12) Lift the head off the engine block (it's heavy!). If it wont budge, gently prise it up or get extra help. The only thing holding it down is a short piece of rubber pipe and the old head gasket.

That's it, the head is off your engine. Make sure that you keep it safe, and protect the surface from chips and gouges etc.

What to check:

Clean each piston and examine the crown for splits or cracks. Also examine the bores for scoring which would suggest broken rings. If the piston head or the bore looks oily or extremely covered in more carbon than another, examine that bore more closely, because it could well be just the one cylinder which is causing the problem. Also check the head and valves for damage or large cracks which could be causing loss of compression.

If you get to this stage and you find problems, I will happily walk you through how to repair the engine further, none of which gets any harder.

God, that was a long post
-Pos

Blue smoke is normally oil smoke, i would suspect the turbo seals. Also, take off the breather into the air inlet manifold and see if there is a lot of oil being blown out there - would confirm what POS said.

Be careful you don’t get caught out when you fix it, the exhaust can hold oil and still smoke for some time after.

thanks for all of the the responses, your all great! and POS, i will have to deffo take off the rocker cover so thanks for the advice...the rocker cover is letting out oil! so i may aswell go further! also i have a bottle of redex here, and before i have to spend hundreds i am thinking give it a try? i have come to terms that my engine is **** so why not....ill be the guinea pig hahaha! anyone else used redex? maybe blowing up my 2.5 td is a good thing...coz theres no way im gonna pay hundreds for new injector pumps and such when i can pick up an engine or even a disco for 500 quid...im in the building trade...trust me we are in a recession and money is tight!

Redex is a good additive for fuel and it does exactly what it says on the bottle. It cleans your injectors and it boosts your cetane level. I seriously doubt that there is anything wrong with your injection pump. Just take the head off, leave the injection pump alone and have a look at the pistons. Blue smoke is oil being burned, not fuel and has absolutely nothing to do with the injection pump! You could rebuild your engine for next to £100 as opposed to paying £300 for a new engine and then £70 for the modified exhaust down pipe which you need to make it fit.

-Pos

hiya pos, i tried your test today, putting my thumb over the dip stick tube when it had been warmed up and i wouldnt say there was any pressure really, and there was a little oil on my thumb, a few speckles were jumping up i guess. im guessing thats normal though?

yes a few speckles are usual. That's why newer cars have a bend in the dipstick tube to prevent the oil from spitting out a little. The next thing to suspect is the valve guide seals as mentioned previously because they can cause oil to be burned by the engine. I still wouldnt suspect your fuel pump because that has nothing to do with blue smoke! If it were a fuel injection problem the smoke would either be black as muck or White as ****! (excuse my French).

Have you tried running the engine without the breather pipe connected from the oil filler cap to the intake manifold? If there's still blue smoke with that pipe disconnected the problem could be pointing to a knackered head gasket which isnt really all that hard to replace.

My theory being a perished gasket seal between a push rod clearance and a cylinder clearance which is blowing oil across allowing it to burn in the cylinder.

-pos

your gonna love this!! i got home from work today and went out to take the breather pipe off the intake and run it.....and it was already gone!!!!! wtf?? so i took a second look at the pipe, and its ****ing plumbed into chassis!!! ive had this thing 12 months and done loads of little jobs and playing about and never ever noticed!!! suppose when things are running fine its out of sight out of mind!!! so the answer is yes, its smoking without the breather pipe connected to intake haha! and im thinking its letting a fair amout of oil out the pipe too but couldnt tell as it was goin dark!! will look proper tommos!

The breather pipe is the only direct source of oil from the engine into the combustion chambers, so considering that the pipe is disconnected, I would take your head off and replace the head gasket. It is quite possible that a little bit of the gasket that creates a seal between one or two of the cylinders and the push rod holes (they're fairly close) has blown out, thus breaking the seal and causing the engine to loose its efficiency and burn its own oil.

If you go ahead with this, make sure that you get some emory cloth and really clean up the underside of the head and the top of the block so that when it comes to fitting a new gasket, the seal is fantastic. Don't, whatever you do, apply any oil or silicone sealant to the gasket surface (as I mistakenly did!). It needs to be fitted bone dry to create the best seal.

The only other thing that it can be is of course the valve guide seals but I'm not quite sure how you get at replacing them?

-Pos

OK to replace the valve guide oil seals, you first gotta take off the head.

If you are removing the head, and have the parts, i.e. the valve guide oil seals, you may as well replace them cos it isfoolish not to.

If you are replacing the valve guide oil seals, you may as well re seat the valves, again cos it woul dbe silly not to.

So, you need:
Valve Grinding stick (about £4, halfords comes with paste0
Valve spring compressor - Big one, not weedy one, OR a large vice and a friend.

Basically, you remove each valve in turn by compressing the spring, removing the collects and taking out the valve, reseat it with the stick and paste, taking care to not leave paste behind

Then you may as well wire brush your ports up a bit.

Then, with a pair of pliers you pull off the old Rubber oil seals off the TOP of the valve guides, and push on the new ones.

Also, it is wise to check your valves for wear, i.e how loose they are in the guides, and check them for damage to the mating surface.

Reassamble. I almost lost a finger replacing the valve springs cos my friend who was holding the head while I operated the vice to squash the spring moved it and it jumped out. The springs are really strong.

Having said all this, its not a complicated job and a novice could rebuild the head in this way in about 3-4 hours, and all your valves will seal HUGE amounts better, so improving compression and so efficiency, power, etc.

Hopefully itll burn less oil too.

pos said:

The breather pipe is the only direct source of oil from the engine into the combustion chambers, so considering that the pipe is disconnected, I would take your head off and replace the head gasket. It is quite possible that a little bit of the gasket that creates a seal between one or two of the cylinders and the push rod holes (they're fairly close) has blown out, thus breaking the seal and causing the engine to loose its efficiency and burn its own oil.

If you go ahead with this, make sure that you get some emory cloth and really clean up the underside of the head and the top of the block so that when it comes to fitting a new gasket, the seal is fantastic. Don't, whatever you do, apply any oil or silicone sealant to the gasket surface (as I mistakenly did!). It needs to be fitted bone dry to create the best seal.

The only other thing that it can be is of course the valve guide seals but I'm not quite sure how you get at replacing them?

-Pos

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Unfortunatly if the rings and bores are worn then it passes oil as well, and you are probably looking at an engine, the guy who sold you it knew what he was doing. It sounds like you have serious back pressure and that's pistons.

As pos says it's not rocket science to rebuild one of these, but the cost can creep up and up as you strip it. Putting new rings in it, if the pistons are ok is only a stop gap, because they dont last long, and I personally feel it's a waste of time fitting new pistons into worn bores, when for a few more pounds you can rebore it and have a new block. There used to be people who would bore it in place, I guese if you go that route then you can do search for one.

Can you find a replacement engine with a guarantee??

david451 said:

Unfortunatly if the rings and bores are worn then it passes oil as well, and you are probably looking at an engine, the guy who sold you it knew what he was doing. It sounds like you have serious back pressure and that's pistons.

As pos says it's not rocket science to rebuild one of these, but the cost can creep up and up as you strip it. Putting new rings in it, if the pistons are ok is only a stop gap, because they dont last long, and I personally feel it's a waste of time fitting new pistons into worn bores, when for a few more pounds you can rebore it and have a new block. There used to be people who would bore it in place, I guese if you go that route then you can do search for one.

Can you find a replacement engine with a guarantee??

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Exactly. I ended up spending about £250 on mine which in theory could have bought or pretty much bought a 200 tdi. The again, I would have been tempted to strip the 200 down and rebuild that too.

-Pos

pos said:

Exactly. I ended up spending about £250 on mine which in theory could have bought or pretty much bought a 200 tdi. The again, I would have been tempted to strip the 200 down and rebuild that too.

-Pos

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Good project that so it is, find a fooked one and recon it in your own time, all nice and clean and painted, and if you dont use it sell it. Let's face it you have done one already, so it should be a scooshy.

Wonder what the going price is for a recon engine, and there must be loads of fooked ones about. You could make a bit of cash for yourself.

david451 said:

Good project that so it is, find a fooked one and recon it in your own time, all nice and clean and painted, and if you dont use it sell it. Let's face it you have done one already, so it should be a scooshy.

Wonder what the going price is for a recon engine, and there must be loads of fooked ones about. You could make a bit of cash for yourself.

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You may just have given me my Summer holiday project! A reconditioned 200 tdi engine can go for over £1,200. If I can buy an old one for about £300, and all the parts (ie. pistons, rings, bearings and a new water pump etc.), I could sell it as a refurbished engine for about £800, making £300 to £400 (each engine ) I'll look into it!

Cheers

-Pos