Well it started out this way. A few weeks ago the shaft between the intake and exhaust turbines on the turbocharger broke and allowed the oil to get into the cylinders. I ran for many miles and noticed high EGT so I backed off. I installed the new turbo yesterday and started the truck up and idled for about 20 minutes. No problems, no grey smoke I thought the problem was solved. As I drove up my driveway all was great, I took it very easy. Down the hill on the other side the rpm’s began increasing greatly. Grey smoke came out the exhaust so I slowed down by breaking very hard in 1st gear (automatic transmission). Finally the back tires started burning out so I turned off the key. The engine would not stop, it revved up to 4K or a little higher before it finally decided it would stop running. All in all it revved uncontrolled about 20 seconds all the while blowing out allot of grey smoke. I mean it was like the worst fog I have ever been in.
Restarted the truck after about 2 minutes it revved up uncontrollable for about 20 seconds again and again allot of grey smoke. No excessive heat in the water or EGT.
I let it sit for 10 minutes and restarted it again and had some control over the engine with the foot feed, but it always over revved. Again allot of grey smoke.
The last time I restarted it I now have a dead cylinder, but I can control the rpm’s.
I know this is a lot of information and I know I have a serious problem, may be rings have been washed by all the extra oil or may be valve seals have been blown out because oil was in the cylinder. Any ideas you have could help.

Thanks in advance for your input.
Antenna Guy

 

Sounds like you lost an injector?

 

My two sons came back home for a day of truck work. We took the head off. The head is not to bad but as we got it all the way off we saw the problem. The #5 piston is toast. Allot of metal fused into the top of the piston. So we dropped the oil pan and looked at the bottom of #5…not bad. We drove the piston up out the top of the block and it needs to be replaced. Bearings look good, rod in good (not bent), head looks pretty good.
So anybody know a good source of pistons, bearings, and possible head?

Antenna Guy

 

What part of california do you live in?

 

Placerville

 

It's just me but I would prefer Cummins parts, http://www.cumminswestinc.com/locations/sacramento-ca

Further away but Joel is a good source in Redding...

http://jandhperformance.com/

 

I have heard of this exact same thing!!!! The turbo went kaput on a delivery truck here in town and a friend of mine worked on it. Long story short, they put a reman engine in the truck and fired it up......and VVVRRROOOOOOOMMMMM it went......no controlling it! It finally blew itself up!!!!!

Tore everything down and found the problem. When the turbo went it allowed crazy amounts of oil to build up in the intercooler. When they fired the new motor up it was running basically on all of the accumulated oil that was built up in the IC. Even with the key off the engine was trying to redline itself.....which eventually it did do......KABOOOM. They said it wasn't pretty at all.

So, after a cleaned out IC and another reman engine all was well. Sure sounds like an awful lesson learned...but hey, after all.....the engines are "oil-burners!!!!"

Just a thought.

 

dangit.. hate to hear that..
Anytime you have a turbo failure, the intercooler should be pulled and cleaned.. As you found, there will typically be lots of engine oil, and lots of metal...
On a side note, now would be a great time to install head studs.

 

I have has a catastrophic failure in my pickup truck engine. After losing the factory Holset turbo I replaced it with a new one. However the amount of oil that permeated my intercooler was underestimated by me. Upon restart all was OK but under a small amount of revving the Cummins engine went into an un-stoppable revving for about 20-30 seconds. Needless to say this was not a good thing. To make a long story short I have taken the head off and one piston has the top ring groove exposed, another is deformed due to what ever happened. The cylinders look pretty good, no bad scoring inside. Head gasket was in-tact, no oil in the water, no diesel in the oil. I have taken out the worst piston and the bearings look very good.
What can I do now? Should I replace all pistons and hone the block? Who can do my head work? How much should it cost? How long will it take?
The truck is mine originally so nothing has been done that I don’t know of. It has 188,000 miles on it.

 

I never thought an electronic diesel could run away like that. Intercooler filled with oil even though it's not injected at high pressure. Very interesting.

What an ordeal.

 

Ugg! hate to hear a story like this one especially when i'm limping my engine around until the 20th when it goes it for it's own problems. Unexpected but plausible i suppose. Oil in the IC would just be added fuel to the combustion chamber even though not pressurized. It may not have been enough on a cold engine idle spit of the injector but then i consider engine oil only has to meet the 410 deg flash point to be considered good. That to me means i can probably get through 2nd with my EGTs still under 450 but beyond that i'm over and the combustion chamber temperature is going to be even hotter than that. Once you have that ignited it will push rpms up, more boost thus providing more "fuel oil" from the air going through the IC. As far as electronics go i'm not sure what would prevent runaway of this type. Electronic injectors at the point of shutoff wouldn't be the main fuel, just a supplement. But being a finite amount of fuel in the IC the engine would eventually die, hopefully before the boom.

Again sorry to hear about your engine