I brought my engine to a new mechanic a month ago because my mechanic said he couldn't work on my truck for 2 days, I big storm was coming the day he said he could look at it so I made the huge mistake of seeing someone else. Basically what was wrong with my truck was a bolt fell out of my front caliper and was binding against my wheel. I had problems starting my truck when cold so had to use the block heater to ensure it would start on cold mornings. Coincidently the block heater just died the same night the bolt fell out so when the tow truck came to get my truck it wouldn't start. The tow guy followed me to the garage and after unloading it the mechanic told his son to get a can of silicone spray and sprayed it into my air cleaner to get the truck started. It eventually started and ran perfect just like it did all along. After 9 days he finally calls me to say he found the problem, he says my airdog lift pump is dead. I tell him I have a working spare, I drop it off and get a call saying that it's dead too??? I know it's not so I make a harness up that matches the airdog and test it at home and it runs fine. I show him it runs fine and he acts like it's still broken even though it's turning fine. I explain to him that this is a fp-100 which revs 1000rpm less then the more common fp-150. He still doesn't believe me and there's a blizzard coming so I order a new fp-150 kit for $600 next day air! After installing it he calls to say yeah this truck has more problems. He says he got it started but the engine just "blew up" I'm thinking ok what does this mean? He says he finally got it started and it just blew up and someone had to jump and run to do something to try to turn it off? I'm like so are you saying my engine is dead and I need a new one? "Oh, no it just reved like a bastard and we couldn't get it to stop!" I'm like oh really? I waited to here back from him after the weekend and heard nothing I waited a. Full week and he still didn't call me!?? I finally call and get his son who definitely had a weird uncomfortable tone in his voice, the father gets on the phone and starts blaming all my problems on my aftermarket mods like the airdog and my bulldog PMT??? I ask him did you check the fuel pressure? Did you check the apps? Did you run a scan on the computer? He says no & then says because of my remote car starter wiring under the dash is a mess he's all done working on my truck? What does that have to do with anything? So we leave it with I will get it towed away asap. He never has once even mentioned what I owe him for the work he's already done, which I think shows guilt of something done wrong. My normal mechanic runs a diagnostic and finds that a manifold pressure sensor that allows the grid heater to turn on was dead. This is the entire reason why it wouldn't start when cold and why there was nothing else wrong with my truck. He replaced the sensor and it started right up and "didn't rev like a bastard" it idles as it should but now just billows grayish white smoke out of the exhaust non stop. He thinks there's a problem with an injector dumping too much fuel into the engine. He also says this truck has a throttle body? I told him I think the other guy sprayed too much silicone spray into the engine and over reved it and floated a valve causing it to burn lots of engine oil. Anyone else have any suggestions? I don't even know if I have any legal recourse?

 

it did not float a valve and the truck does not have a throttle body. the truck does not need a grid heater. i think one of your injectors is bad causing low rail pressure when starting. cap off one injector at a time until you find the smokey one

 

Holy Smokes! There are bad mechanics, and then there's the devil!! Which one did you get?

Is your oil level dropping? That would be bad news. If it's rising, then you know it's an injector and you need to stop driving before you melt something!

Grid heaters are not really required to start the truck. I agree with carl48 that you need to check rail pressure.

 

But I don't understand why it was not smoking at all when I brought it to the mechanic, it just wouldn't start up easily if it was below freezing. What explains the engine redlining for one mechanic and then just smoking for the other? It did none of these for me.

 

if you saturate the filter with a fluid, like the spray he used the engine will run until it removes enough fuel from the filter to stop, you can turn the key off and it makes no difference, the only way to shut it down is to place in 6th gear and kill it. luckily the filter did not hold enough fuel to run long enough to destroy the engine. beer barrel is giving good advice on not driving it until you find out if it is fuel or oil, with the injector not cutting off it causes firing on compression and is very hard and hot on the piston and washes the cylinder walls. a gauge from genosgarage.com is $153.28

 

Reading your story:

What might have happened at the satan mechanic's shop is that during their experimentation, what it was as they're clearly try-a-part type mechanics who know a little about everything, but a lot of nothing; anyway, I bet they were experimenting by spraying stuff into the intake to cause engine to run hoping that would "fix" things and dumped enough volatiles of questionable consequences (silicon!?!) into the intake to cause a runaway. And because of the runaway, there was no governance and you could be entirely correct, the valves got damaged. That may why they are trying to blame you for their problems by pointing at things unrelated to the fuel system. The mechanic is clearly an idiot- you should have taken your truck back as soon as he claimed the replacement lift pump was bad.

By the way, the other way to kill a runaway engine is to cover the air intake with a rag or rubber stopper (if there is such a thing).

I would contact an attorney - basically a $200 charge and the attorney can look at your evidence and etc., if this mechanic runs a shop he should be licensed and have some form of insurance. Do not let too much time pass.

You may have a case with your insurance company as well, if you have comprehensive coverage, call it an explosion at the shop, and see if they'll go for it.

 

I hate hearing stuff like this. I try to do all my own work. I am in the process of pulling my engine. I have horrible blow-by and massive oil consumption. I think my previous owner hurt mine somehow while towing horses.
Keep us updated & good luck.

 

First off, what year are we dealing with?

It is time to get some diagnostics going before you hurt this thing worse. I will lay a hundred dollar bill that Satan mechanic is the issue behind the smoke, but good luck litigating it.

For now, lets get a compression test run, can you post a youtube video of the smoke? When you say running normally other than the smoke, the engine sounds like it did before, no louder or strange noises?

It is quite possible he hurt a head gasket with his runaway on sprayed in spray bit.

 

Fortunately one of my plowing customers is an attorney. The truck is an 03', I've never had it back to run diagnostics on the truck. The current mechanic is planning on sending out all my injectors out to get inspected but I just don't see that as being a problem, I originally thought that may be the case up until me he told me that bad sensor was preventing the grid heater to come on. I feel like I'm about to spend $100s to get them checked for no reason. I'm guessing if I asked Chrysler or Cummins if it was ok to spray an aerosol into my air cleaner they would give me a big NO WAY! If I tried to make a warranty claim on this exact same situation but just happened to say oh it wouldn't start so I sprayed a bunch of silicone spray into it they would say I was responsible for the malfunction. So if this mechanic says he sprayed silicone into my engine he's responsible if I can prove my truck is defective because of that? It does sound really hard to prove it. I haven't actually heard the truck run. The satan mechanic probably sprayed a crap load of spray in there because he had lost prime on the fuel once he disconnected my working air dog. It would probably also help if I prove my "defective" pump was fine too.

 

I'd talk to my insurance agent to see if a situation like this is covered by your policy.

 

Here again, a proper diagnosis including a compression test will go a long way to not spending more than is necessary.

I'm not a space shuttle Cummins guy, but the 03's seem to be pretty solid in not as quick to grenade with a stuck injector or drop a valve ( don't worry, if you dropped a valve you would know it. )

I have run these things for minutes on "alternative" fuels such as WD40, but cannot say I would try silicone spray, that seems kind of out there not knowing the contents. There should be no reason for the mechanic to run yours on outside spray anyway, by simply bumping the key, if not once, then certainly not more than twice, should have resulted in a fully charged primary system.
How about we find out what is really wrong, then we try and see if your mechanic hosed it?

 

It's approaching 2 months and I still don't have any answers on my truck. The 2nd mechanic was able to cap of each injector to isolate a bad one. The truck starts up fine and idles ok but just billows tons of black changing to gray smoke. So bad that they say I wouldn't be able to drive it down the road because drivers behind me wouldn't be able to see. He said fuel pressures are normal. He says I need to bring it to someone else! Great. He thinks there's maybe 2 injectors bad and that's why the smoke doesn't get better after capping each injector. Don't forget this truck ran great with no smoke before I brought it to the 1st mechanic. He said if it was motor oil the level would have dropped because it makes so much smoke. Any ideas guys? I'm about to get another truck.

 

Hope the 1st mechenic didn't bent a push rod when the engine over reved...

 

Redneckdieselpower:

Sorry to hear of the troubles you are having with your truck due to an IDIOT that worked on it!

The members here are giving you some good advice. Let me add a few things.

I have a 1996 Dodge CTD 12 valve that has a high performance Scheid Diesel
Engine with over 800 H.P. In cold weather (below 30-40 degrees) I have to use ether to start my engine due to lower compression. Normally, it doesn't take much but I have had my engines RPM raise up when I use too much. Nothing like yours did though. IF those idiots used a continual stream of silicone spray and that spray had some type of flammable ingredient, it is possible that engine could have "run away",.......that meaning,.....RPM way out of the operating range of your 5.9 Cummins. The ONLY way to stop that is to CUT OFF the air to the engine or "force a stall" as the other members pointed out. I have seen diesel engines "run away" and a few them did come apart or were internally damaged. I am wondering if due to the "run away" you possibly have an intake valve stuck wide open in one or more of the cylinders. If fuel is pouring into the cylinders like that your smoke could be
as you described.

I suggest going and getting your truck from those IDIOTS, and take it to a
reputable Dodge or Cummins Certified Shop and let them diagnose and check
the engine out. That means checking the compression, injectors, valves etc. to see what is going on. At that point you can decide whether or not to fix or get rid of the truck Sir.

Good luck to you!

---------
John_P

 

Do you have a set of gauges to make sure you are building boost?

Also, where are you located?