I was on the highway today and a semi tractor was pushin about 4 ft of flames out the stacks...... What sort of thing would cause this? (he was not driving anymore, stopped on the side of the road....)

 

I've seen that at night before, on an older semi. I'm not sure if it because theres no intercooler and it just running to hot, too much fuel, or if they have hooked a sparkplug to the exhaust to burn the exhaust gases going out. I've seen the sparkplug trick done on some hotrods. I'm sure someone else will chime in.

 

The old B61 Macks were running just about right when you had a needle point flame about four inches out of the stack, been there done that a time or two.

 

this wasnt any needlepoint flame and it wasnt 4 inches..... it looked like someone just lit up the olympic stadium torch......

 

That sounds like unburned fuel in the stacks that caught on fire or the muffler liner got hot enough to catch fire and burn out.

 

pulling over for some road kill grillin????

 

Sure you can blow smoke, but can you blow flames???

 

made for some interesting chatter on the cb this morning..... had to go to class, so i never really figured out what it was......

 

or he had some sort of pretty major mechanical failure like a dropped/bent valve or turbocharger failure...

i've gotten flames out the stacks of the loco's at work when we've had turbo failures, but the best flames were out of a GE loco with a broken conrod. yes, engine still running, still making 4500hp, with one piston jammed up in the hole, raw fuel going into the exhaust and a nice orange flame out the stack about 6-8 feet up... [the stack is about 10" across and 24" wide]

 

If you remember the B61's you are old , now if you have ever had the privleage of shifting one of those old two stickers you for sure will appreciate the newer technology of todays transmissions Goodluck,,,Rick

 

Whatever he did to his I wouldn't mind doing it to mine...


(Turbo/ valve failure excluded...)

I can dig 4 foot flames coming out of dual sideliner smoke clouds.

 

sorry all, couldnt safely grab my digital camera quick enough... i was on the highway driving about 75..... getting camera out of backpack wouldnt have been safe...... it was sure an interesting site though......

From the looks of it, im thinking turbo failure...... pyro gauge might be a worthwhile investment next time around?!?!?!?!

 

Some of the older GE's, if left to sit for a while(over an hour or 2) if you blasted off hard, rolled right into the throttle, you could get flame from them, even with everything right. Pretty cool at night.

 

I've heard of the old Detroits being able to push flames out of the stacks. Do you know what kind of truck it was and how old. I would love to have a truck like that in all black and chrome. Cool

 

I've seen the old (blown) Cummins 2 n' 6 bits (275 hp) and the 300 do it and old blown DDs. Never saw a turboed diesel do it even when they had a puking injector. Craig