She always had a little "chug" to her at idle so thought maybe an injector going bad or something, but she always ran GREAT. But one night she lost a whole cylinder and it wasnt the injector or anything in the valvetrain. So it was time to pull the head and see what happened. What I discovered was ugly. I cant believe she ran as long as she did and went through everything i put her through. She will be missed......until I get the P pump motor dropped in LOL



http://s1133.photobucket.com/albums/m600/shibbyman22/

 

hey-Hey!!!,
That is indeed not pretty. What did cause it? Reminds me of a story my pop told me of his 80-inch Hardly-Ableson flathead; barely enough piston left to attach the rings to the rod...
cheers,
Douglas

 

I'm not sure what caused it....maybe when the previous owner installed the pyro on the downpipe and ran it too hott? That would be my best guess.

 

My guess would be a leaky injector. Was is hazing at idle? That cylinder was definatly very hot!!!

 

never hazed at idle except when cold...obviously LOL

 

what does that mean? A leaky injector would cause that? how?

 

Good grief man, that's a mess! As you say, it's unreal that she ran for so long.


If the injector was leaking, and leaving a pool of diesel overnight for instance, all the fuel is going to want to burn when the engine gets fired up. It's got nowhere to go but the torreoidal, (sp?) recess. Or, if the injector has a bad spray pattern and the fuel isn't burning in the recess, but on the wall or the cone instead, and is burning the metal that way. Either way, that ain't pretty.

 

So that pile is a molten mass of metal ?

Piston reformulation ? or head ?

T.

 

Ouch.

 

thanks i learned something today How would you know if this is happening?

 

Pulling the injectors and having them pop tested. You can check the spray angles as well as the pop off pressure. That's the easiest way. The other way is pulling the head and checking the piston headland and ringland areas for signs of wear... or in shibbyman22's case, destruction! When you see the piston crown, you should be able to see where the fuel is going. There'll be small shiny spots where the fuel hits the recess.

 

This is out of a VE 5.9 in dad's road grader. This was back when I thought pump work was voodoo. We had a shop redo the injectors and pump. They said a crack in the pump's distributor head was the cause, not the injectors. I do remember none of the nozzles were split. They replaced the H&R and rebuilt the injectors. He still has it and it runs great. Really wish we had got the old H&R back now.....

 

The plot thickens....

That's interesting, 'cause I though the injectors are capable of supplying only so much fuel. And if the injectors were good, why would that cook a piston? Fuel seeping past the seal? Mmm...


Sure did make a mess of that piston though.

 

Its all piston.. Maybe a little bit of valve. Aluminum goes molten at around 930 degrees C. Steel at around 1370 deg C. So that piston would be long gone before there would be steel on that piston.