Glow plugs

[jake_crew]

Has anyone fitted glow-plugs to an older engine to help with cold starting ?

 

Any tips ?

[koukouvagia]

Has anyone fitted glow-plugs to an older engine to help with cold starting ?

 

Any tips ?

 

I don't know how suitable these are for all types of engine, but I've got one of these fitted to the air intake on my Kelvin and it works a treat. It needs its own diesel feed and 12v (or 24v) supply. I've got mine tee-ed off the day tank, although it uses such a small amount of diesel you could probably rig up some sort of small reservoir for it.

 

 

When I had the Seffle, an alternative method of starting to a blow lamp was a primitive glow plug. I never found this very effective, though.

 

ETA. I should have said it's called a Thermostart. Suppliers on ebay.

Edited November 26, 2012 by koukouvagia

[David Schweizer]

Quite a few owners of older tractors fit a heater plug into the intake manifold to assist winter starting, with apparently good results. Or so I was told by our local Agricultural Merchant!

[alan_fincher]

Quite a few owners of older tractors fit a heater plug into the intake manifold to assist winter starting, with apparently good results. Or so I was told by our local Agricultural Merchant!

The Perkins P3 in the boat I had many years ago, (which I understood to possibly be a small tractor engine), had had such an arrangement once, although it was long defunct on our example.

 

So, yes, I'm sure this is true.

[RLWP]

Reginald's Gleniffer has a pair of heater plugs

 

Richard

[jake_crew]

Reginald's Gleniffer has a pair of heater plugs

 

Richard

Ooooo please tell me more - pref with some photos.

 

Thx

[RLWP]

I don't know much about them:

 

 

They are both of the 'thin' BMC type and screw into an adapter that was in the head when Mike got her

 

Richard

[alan_fincher]

That looks to me like it is an engine always fitted with glow plugs, just that maybe it has been adapted to another type?

 

You wouldn't want to try introducing plugs into the actual head of an engine not originally built with them, though would you?

 

I assumed the question was about an engine that is direct injection, not originally fitted with anything into the cylinders. Is that right, please?

[RLWP]

No glowplugs on a 1930's lifeboat engine - no battery!

 

Richard

[alan_fincher]

No glowplugs on a 1930's lifeboat engine - no battery!

 

Richard

Fair enough.

 

But they seem to be screwing into a raised bit of the casting of the head that I can't entirely see why it would have been included, other than as somewhere that something might have screwed into.

 

Was there ever perhaps some kind of "non electric" starting aid, in some way?

 

(......Shuffles off, possibly firmly out of his depth!....)

[RLWP]

Fair enough.

 

But they seem to be screwing into a raised bit of the casting of the head that I can't entirely see why it would have been included, other than as somewhere that something might have screwed into.

 

Was there ever perhaps some kind of "non electric" starting aid, in some way?

 

(......Shuffles off, possibly firmly out of his depth!....)

 

There was most definitely a non-electric starting system, it was air start!

 

I've had a bit of a dig through the documents I have, and I don't know what those ports were for. They might be where air valves screwed into the head to use one cylinder to recharge the tanks while running on the other one

 

Richard

[jake_crew]

They might be where air valves screwed into the head to use one cylinder to recharge the tanks while running on the other one.

 

Richard

You are exactly right Richard.

 

We still have the air start gear, but haven't used it for many a decade.

 

And Alan, it is a direct injection engine, but those ports looked most promising as a mounting point for glow-plugs. Its good that Richard has confirmed that this is possible.

Edited November 26, 2012 by jake_crew

[RLWP]

It looks a pretty easy job too, the plugs are screwed into a standard BSP union with one end threaded internally for the plug

 

Richard

Edited November 26, 2012 by RLWP

[koukouvagia]

Was there ever perhaps some kind of "non electric" starting aid, in some way?

 

 

Yes there were three ways of starting the Seffle: blowlamp, air start and "fireworks". One of these was placed in a special holder which screwed into the cylinder head and lit. To be honest, the engine started better with the blowlamp.

 

The air start too, was not ideal, It took a long time to charge up and you only had enough air charge for one or two attempts to start. I only used it a couple of time after I found a stamp on the air start cylinder which said it was fifty years since it had last been tested. I had visions of a mighty explosion!

Edited November 26, 2012 by koukouvagia

[bizzard]

Also handy for pumping your tyres up. Some petrol engined ancient cars came supplied with an adapter, hose and tyre valve connector in their tool kit that screwed into a spark plug hole once the plug was removed to use the engine as an air compressor for tyre inflation. Mainly S/V engines though, easier than OHV ect.

[alan_fincher]

And Alan, it is a direct injection engine, but those ports looked most promising as a mounting point for glow-plugs. Its good that Richard has confirmed that this is possible.

You didn't actually tell us what engine you were talking about though, did you!

 

I.m supposed to guess it is a match for the one in "reg", (presumably), then am I?

[David Schweizer]

The Perkins P3 in the boat I had many years ago, (which I understood to possibly be a small tractor engine), had had such an arrangement once, although it was long defunct on our example.

 

So, yes, I'm sure this is true.

Tractor engines are not independant units, the engine block is cast into the chassis main frame of the tractor, but the power unit is often basicly the same as a commercial engine.

 

Fair enough.

 

But they seem to be screwing into a raised bit of the casting of the head that I can't entirely see why it would have been included, other than as somewhere that something might have screwed into.

 

Was there ever perhaps some kind of "non electric" starting aid, in some way?

 

(......Shuffles off, possibly firmly out of his depth!....)

The Field Marshall Tractor single cylinder engine was started byusing a smouldering wick and a shotgun cartridge (minus the shot) and hitting it with a hammer:-

 

Edited November 26, 2012 by David Schweizer

[bizzard]

Way back in the 1970's David I had my Landrover boat and trailer rescued from being sunk in the mud on the river Crouch by a Field Marshall tractor. I'd sunk up to my axles with a huge rock in front of my differential stopping forward progress of pulling my Lysander sailing boat out. The tide was a'creeping up and would have covered the whole ensemble, i even started in a futile manner to build a mud Dam around it all with a bit of driftwood and was prepared to standby and bale as the tide crept up but suddenly remembered a little boat builders over the rise and went and pleaded with them to help which they did with their ancient Field Marshall tractor. It was all very tense, tide getting closer, them stuffing the saltpeter wick in the cylinder head and lighting it, and two of them turning a two man starting handle. And suddenly and thankfully it erupted into motion. BONK! BONK! bonk bonk bonk bonk, and it bonked its way out to the rescue. They staked the tractor wheels in and ran out its winch cable to my Landrover and engaged its clutch. And BONK, bonk, bonk, the thing pulled the whole ensemble out and up the muddy beach with huge great Bonking jerks including half of the rock that had impeded my progress in the first place with the menacing tide following it up inch by inch. The boat of course I wasn't worried about as it would just float off and be quite happy but the Landrover would probably have been ruined after a tidefull of salt water. That tractor had some torque.

[jake_crew]

You didn't actually tell us what engine you were talking about though, did you!

 

I.m supposed to guess it is a match for the one in "reg", (presumably), then am I?

Sorry Alan,

 

Yes it is the Gleniffer identical to Reginalds' and can be seen running in the link my signature line.

We're trying to wean it off E**yS***t you see.

Once its got down to stone cold (more than over night) its not really interested until it gets a sniff or two at this time of year.

[alan_fincher]

Sorry Alan,

 

Yes it is the Gleniffer identical to Reginalds' and can be seen running in the link my signature line.

We're trying to wean it off E**yS***t you see.

Once its got down to stone cold (more than over night) its not really interested until it gets a sniff or two at this time of year.

Sorry! Didn't spot.

 

The Perkins P3 I had in the 1970s was always given a whiff of Easystart.

 

Well nobody told be back then it was a "bad thing", and frankly, it didn't seem to do it any noticeable harm.

 

Yes, yes, I know..... But I was uneducated in such matters at the time!

[jake_crew]

A Field Marshall recovery demo here from this Summer :-

 

 

One of the on-lookers was heard to say "They New Hollands is crap in the mud !"

[RLWP]

Sorry Alan,

 

Yes it is the Gleniffer identical to Reginalds' and can be seen running in the link my signature line.

We're trying to wean it off E**yS***t you see.

Once its got down to stone cold (more than over night) its not really interested until it gets a sniff or two at this time of year.

 

You don't stuff a gas blowtorch up the manifold then?

 

Richadr

[jake_crew]

Not usually, but a nice warm fire in the back cabin definitely helps.

 

I'm sure I've seen summat written down about using a wad of smouldering paper in the air intake - a bit like the Field Marshall.

 

But we were looking for a more technical solution to reluctant starting. Though we still feel that the injection timing could do with more tweaking. Its a shame its laborious to adjust, not like the little vernier wheel on the distributor of my old mini.

Edited November 27, 2012 by jake_crew

[ditchcrawler]

As late as the eighties we had lifeboats offshore that had spring inertia starters and hydraulic starters. The hydraulics were auto recharging if the engine started, if it didn't you pumped it up. Some of them also had easystart injector systems where the instructions tell you to give it a shot before starting.

[RLWP]

How many inches advanced is your Gleniffer?

 

Richard