Howdy all,
2 quick but rather important questions. first off, Ive only owned this truck for about a month, and am just learning my way around it (94 cummins 2500 4wd). When I bought it, it had really low power and blew a lot of smoke, so I figured 'turbos blown'. so I bought a new one, and before I install it, how can do I prime this sucker with oil so it doesn't blow as soon as I turn the engine on? second, once I have the old one out (which seems to spin fine from the intake side andyways) how can I tell what was wrong with it? what does th eturbo sound like when it kicks in? second, I replaced my fuel/water seperator filter (wow did that suck, the guy before me tightened the hell out of it, and its so hard to get in there, actually took me about 1/5th of the time to change out the belt). How do I prime the new one now that its installed but empty? How do I fill it up with fuel ? Isn't it bad for a diesel pump dry even for a second? Im going to try to do these projests tuesday, so any help ASAP would be great! Thanks!

 

For priming the fuel system there's a hand pump. Simply pump a long time ant hten some more and it's primed again.
For the turbo I usually take the stock oil line and remove it from the engine, and then squirt some regular engine oil into it with the handy oil can. (be shure the oil is very clean)- I do this while spinning the turbo by hand. Then I bolt the oil feed line back on the engine and that's it. I let the truck idle for about 5 minutes before taking off after doing this.

HTH

AlpineRAM

 

Before you install a new turbo, you will want to make sure that it's actually needed. If the turbo was the problem you'd get lots of black smoke. What color smoke do you have?
On a stock engine you generally cannot hear the turbo spooling up, and can't really feel it as it is very smooth spooling up, when stock.

I agree with AlpineRam on the priming part, but I probably wouldn't do that myself. I'd turn the engine over once I got tired of hand pumping.
Turning over the engine with the injector pump dry will not hurt anything for the short time until the fuel gets to it. The injector pump on that engine is lubricated by oil, so it won't be a problem.

Chris

 

As Stamey said, make sure that you need the turbo. First check the boots on the intercooler to make sure that they are not loose. The boot on the passenger side is especially prone to coming loose and will produce the same results as you indicate.

 

If you can get the vanes in the turbo to scrape the housing your turbo is toast. Just grab the nut on the impeller and see if you can get the shaft to move. If you can't, send the turbo back. You didn't say what color smoke you had and if it was only on acceleration or if it was only cold. Give us a little more info and we can help more.
Just below the filter is a black primer button. Get your self a stick about 2' long and just loosen the bleeder on top of the filter and pump until you get fuel. It does take a lot of pumping and the position of the primer makes it difficult to pump much without the stick.
Tom

 

Save your thumb! If you have access to a compressor, set your regulator at 5-10 lbs. and wrap a shop towel around the end of your hose and shove it into the filler neck of your fuel tank. Crack open the bleeder screw on the top of the fuel filter housing and put the LIGHT air pressure to the tank. By pressurizing the tank you will quickly see the bleeder screw begin to bubble air out of the line, continue until you see a steady stream of fuel, tighten the bleeder screw down and you now have your system primed to the filter.

I usually go over and crack a couple of injector lines at the injector, crank the motor over, no more than 10-15 seconds at a time with a couple minutes for the starter to cool off, until I see a steady stream of fuel at the injectors. Sometimes the truck will try to start almost immediately, I just shut it down and go tighten down the lines. It should start very quickly, it will run rough and smoke alot but it will clear very quickly.

I never use the primer on the lift pump anymore, once you pressurize the tank once, you won't either.

 

Everybody forgot to tell ya where the primer pump is , on the drivers side under the intake manifold about halfway up from the oil pan on the back 1/2 of the block, fuel lines coming from the rear to this unit then out torwords the main pump , this unit has a prefilter bowl on the bottom , also has a heater in there, then you should find a rubber covered plunger aimed at an angle facing you if your standing in the midle of the drivers fender, some guys like to use a stick to reach it to pump with, then to help on the turbo, taking the intake hose off to see if it spins freely and try to move the nut up and down then side to side , if all checks out the last thing to look for is to see if the oil seals blew , that would mean oil going out the exhaust , so that means seperating the downpipe from the turbo to look for excessive wet from oil, to save money try to confirm with maybe 2 tests so we don't use you to keep the economey going all by yourself.

 

Howdy again,
I appreciate the quick help. The smoke is indeed black diesel smoke. It comes out pretty thick mainly when i shift up and when I accelerate. maybe im just not used to the diesel engine yet? anyways, I can drive it without making it smoke but then I'm sloooowwww. highway is about 2000rpms at 60-70. high end is powerful as hell, im just hurting on the low side of things and in the accelerrating department. the holset unit seems ok, it spins freely, and the shaft seems to have no play in it. Is it fine and im just freaking out a little bit? I was going to change it out today, but not now. I just took my pack test and im going to chill fo rhte evening. again, thanks for all the help guys.
-Alex

 

Look for a boost leak first. From your description it sound like you aren't getting enough air, but the turbo seems to not be blown up/worn out/broken. Follow the hoses from the outlet of the turbo to th eintake and make sure you haven't slipped a hose off, or split one. In rare instances the end of the intercooler can come apart also.
If it comes to making a tester, you can take some PVC, I think it's 3", with an end cap on one end and a port drilled in it for compressed air to enter, and clamp it into the piping where it comes out of the turbo, then turn on the air. If you have a leak you will be able to tell for sure. Be careful not to put too much air into this setup because what doesn't escape through the exhaust, if you happen to have one cylinder sitting at valve overlap, goes past the rings and through the crankcase. You probably don't want more than about 30 psi in the test setup.

Chris

 

i forgot to say that when I got the the rear main seal was blown and she was leaking oil like a sieve when you killed the ignition. this was what made me think the turbo was blown. oil level got too low, turbo siezed up. i'll go check her for leaks this evening. thanks again!
-alex

 

This is goignt o sound really stupid. I fired the engine up, with the air intake to the turbo off, and that sucker was spinning no problem. so then i started looking for leaks. i never before checked the bottom of the filter (stupid) I just peeked at the top of it and watched the worthless minder. so I peeled the filter out and it was just covered in sludge. there was almost no breathability in that thing. so, im going to assume that was the problem for now until i get a new filter, and if its still funky, then ill go from there. sometimes im a real idiot and just dont check the simple stuff. what do you all think about the bolt on K&N air filters? worth it?
-Alex

 

From all the testing everybody's sayen that the K&Ns pass tomuch small particals in dusty conditions, next if you're geting sluge in airbox then you may have a problum with the crankcase ventlation , a simple and cheep thing to fix.

 

I was wondering about that. and southern NV is definetaly dusty conditions. I think when my rear main was leaking (and the undercarriage was covered in oil), that some of it must have blown up into the box.
-Alex

 

Look into AFE ProGuard 7, if you don't want stock. AFE's are reusable and high flow.

Chris