Bmc 1.5 breakdown and stranded. Help!

[Boatman Al]

Hi all

 

I'm writing this from fradley junction where my boat has broke down after two weeks of problem free cruising. I'm a liveaboard so it's a disaster now for work and child etc.

 

I'm in real need of help and advice on my problem. Here's the story

 

It's a bmc 1.5.

 

After two weeks cruising I got up one morning and it wouldn't start. Clearly sounded like it had no fuel. I had just under half a tank.

 

So I went straight for the filters. Found a bit of crap in my water trap. Some black gunk in my lift pump gauze and could not see inside my spin filter but replaced it anyway. Filled the tank.

 

Needless to say the bleeding process was a total pig. I got it going again. But during my bleeding the governor screw on my fuel pump came away with pieces of the housing thread in the screw. I couldn't get it back in the same distance and had to go a bit further in to get it to bite. This was fiddly and was causing low revs and cut outs till I got it balanced.

 

Anyway. Someone suggested diesel bug and sold me a biocide killer which I put in.

 

I got going. A little wobbly especially on engaging gears. More smoke than before two. Barely had any previous to this incident. Defiantly less power overall with slower climb on revs.

 

I cruised another day and half until it started starving in the middle of canal and subsequently overheating and cut out totally leaving me beached. Got towed to fradley.

 

Suspected diesel bug or clogged fuel pipes. Called a local boat yard who arrived this morning to fuel polish with all the gear.

 

Dipped the tank and pulled out several samples of perfectly clear and clean red diesel. So they said it's not diesel bug. And said no point paying to have tank cleaned when my fuel looks clear.

 

So here I am. Stuck. The engine will start. But it's wobbly and doesn't sound great. Smokey.

 

All suspicions are now looking at fuel pump but I'm generally a novice in engine repairs and wondered if anyone could speculate what could be going on here?

 

Any tips or advice would be great.

 

Thanks in advance.

[BEngo]

I rather expect that the damage to the governor screw thread and its subsequent re-positioning is at the root of this, but just in case:

 

Bleed the injector pipes again, with the throttle fully open.. Check that all four behave similarly and produce the same sort of quantity of diesel. If one or more are lazy that would point to the fuel pump or fuel starvation at the pump.

 

If that doesn't fix it check the water-trap and filter gauzes again. The biocide may have loosened up some more cr@p.

 

If clean have a good look at the injectors and, if you can, connect them in turn to an injector pipe, bleed it and then crank the engine to see that the fuel comes out as an atomized spray, not a squirt. Keep all your skin well away from the fuel spray. You can rub the injectors over gently with a brass wire brush to remove any carbon deposits on the outside of the nozzle.

 

If that doesn't fix it, take all 4 injectors and the fuel pump to an injection specialist and get them cleaned and checked.

 

N

[John Holden]

Crap round the prop?

[Tony Brooks]

No help to the OP but this perfectly illustrates why I advise that the manual be ignored when bleeding and the screw on top of the governor housing/idle stabilization valve is never messed with.

 

Regrettably I left Fradly this morning. Was it the OP I saw yesterday with a deck board up and when I asked if all was well said that my engine smoked as well?

[p6rob]

Hi Al,

 

Calcutts sell a governor bleed screw assembly but it costs in the region of £50.00 (guess how I know this). Streethay, which is quite a bit nearer to Fradley, didn't have the right bits, but for a couple of quid, supplied me a longer bolt, couple of nuts and copper washers; this worked as a replacement until I visited Calcutt some months later.

 

I have a spare set of injectors that have only done about 20 hours as I replaced them while trying to diagnose problems with my engine, £80.00 if you want them.

 

Do you know if the spring and plunger needle are still under the broken bleed screw?

 

If you're still stuck by then, I could try and help on Friday evening or Saturday afternoon.

 

Rob

[Boatman Al]

Thanks for the replies everyone.

 

I've got someone coming to give it a look see tomorrow afternoon. Also popped to a non marine diesel specialist who knows bmcs from old buses and such. Said they'd be able to recon the pump. Seemed very confident.

 

But still I need to get back to my home mooring! And still don't know exactly what's going on.

 

Bengo. Come to think of it when I bled injector pips one was not spitting quite as much but id need to redo to be sure. Not confident enough to tackle removing injectors themselves. Is it easy?

 

also not check my prop. Should I bother? It's been cruising fine when not starving out.

 

Tony did u see me early doors??? I was with another bloke with boards up about 730 ish.

 

Cheers for that offer rob. I may take you up on that. Really can't do another week on towpath. have to abandon ship. Just too much work and too far away to keep things ship shape.

[bassplayer]

Stuff on prop can appear to go away but then come back to haunt you...check the weed hatch it won't do any harm...

 

Also, diesel will sit on water so if you have a lot of water in the bottom of your tank, it will get drawn in instead of diesel...

 

Yes, could be fuel pump. You can test for that by disconnecting the output and turning it over...

 

Good luck, and let us kno what it was....

[BEngo]

In essence, removing the injectors is easy. Remove the fuel pipe and undo the securing nuts on either side. Then pull the injector out. At this point you need to check you have all the bits that go under the injector at the bottom of the hole in the head. Read Tony Brooks posts in the thread "Marine gearbox attached to BMC 1.5" In this section for what should be there- at least a top-hat or heat shield washer and a copper washer.

 

Refitting is the reverse of removal, but get the extra bits in the right order. Bleed the injectors and that's it.

 

Tony has also fairly recently posted clear instructions on how to get the DPA fuel pump out and back in again and what to do to preserve the pump timing. I don't have a thread reference for that.

 

N

[bottle]

I haven't checked but Tony's excellent site may help.

 

http://www.tb-training.co.uk/

[Tony Brooks]

I haven't checked but Tony's excellent site may help.

 

http://www.tb-training.co.uk/

 

No it won't, but thanks.

 

To recap.

 

The injector pump is mounted onto a triangular adapter block that is fixed to the engine block. On one of the upper corners (the back one I THINK) there is a pointer that is retained in place by two screws in slotted holes. This should line up with a line scribed on the pump's mounting flange.

 

If it does then all well and good. If not use a centro punch or chisel to mark the pump flange in line with the pointer. If you are having the pump reconditioned then omit this step but make sure the reconditioner puts the mark on when the pump is on their test machine.

 

Remove the injector pipes plus the feed and return pipe, undo the three retaining nuts (Bottom one may need unconventional means of loosening/tightening depending on starter motor that is fitted).

 

There is a master spline on the pump drive. That is one "twice as wide as the rest" spline.

 

To refit either twist the pump drive so the master spline lines up with the engine or turn the engine over by HAND so the drive lines up with the pump.

 

Slot the pump back in place but note it often requires a fair old push because of a spring contraption on the drive.

 

Twist the pump to line up the mark and pointer and tighten the pump. Refit all the pipes.

 

Bleed from the bleed screw on the SIDE of the pump body ONLY. Loosen the large pipe unions on the injectors and spin the engine on the starter (throttle open, stop in run position). When fuel spits or drips from the loos unions tighten them up and the engine should start. If not email me or come back here.

 

 

To the OP

 

The boat I passed was on the Coventry , south of Fradley, mid to late afternoon. About a 30ft er.

 

If you screw the idle damper screw too far in it will prevent the governor valve opening fully. This will reduce your maximum power/speed but should NOT cause a misfire or smoke. This is the bit I do not understand about your problem. Two more things to check before you go taking injectors out and the pump off.

 

1. The pipe running FORM the filter to the injector pump is attached to a large hexagon union on the injector pump. Carefully unscrew this large hexagon and there should be a strainer underneath. If bug is about this may be clogged.

 

2. On the return pipe from pump to filter you will see a longer hexagon forming part of the pipe union on the filter head. This is a one way valve and when stuck or clogged it can cause odd symptoms.

 

However I can not see either causing smoke.

[RLWP]

So, Al started the engine, and it did the usual BMC start up thing - generally running with the odd spurt of white smoke as one or other of the injectors didn't fire until it had warmed up a little. It seemed a trifle rough but also seemed to be running on all four cylinders.

 

'OK, stop the engine' - Al pulled the stop cable and... nothing happened. He tried a few more times and the engine kept running, until I reached down and pulled the cable by hand. Then it stopped.

 

I thought that was a bit odd. Why would pulling the cable by the handle not stop the engine, but pulling it on the pump would. Then I found that the lever on the stop spindle was very loose, I unscrewed the retaining bolt with my fingers. Fixing the lever back onto the stop spindle made a big difference to the running*

 

It isn't easy to diagnose intermittent problems, like an engine stopping at inopportune moments, however I think I may have cracked it

 

Richard

 

*I also discovered it is possible to fix the lever back on wrong, so the spring would stop the engine and you would have to hold the stop handle out to make the boat go

[Boatman Al]

Well yesterday some progress was made.

 

Thanks to Richard.

 

He found the following.

 

The stop spindle wasn't fitted correctly and was loose. At one point we couldn't stop the engine. Then at one point it wouldn't start again. This could apparently explain it wandering about rev wise. Possibly even the starve and cut out.

 

We also found a nasty clattering was taking place down towards gear box. This was probably being caused by the fact that one of my front engine mountings wasn't even fastened to the engine at all. So we found a bolt and improvise a fastening. Combined with the fact that the gear box has virtually no oil in at all.

 

The engine itself was very very low on oil. But i had topped it up recently before I set off for crick so it must of burnt up a lot in the week and half cruise.

 

We had it running under load and it seemed ok. All four injectors were working and working evenly. This evening I've added about 3 litres of oil.

 

So the plan now is just to I've it a go and make a move. I'm hoping I don't get a fuel starve underway again because then I'm really dumbfounded.

 

Many thanks to Richard for his work today. He was a lovely chap who taught me a lot and corrected several key things.

[RLWP]

How was The Swan?

 

Richard

[Boatman Al]

Needless to say the swan was incredible. I might break down here more often.

[roggie]

I always check the weed hatch at the end of a days cruising plus oil level via dipstick every morning. I used to check water level too but on our BMC system can't see the level in the tank so just keep a eye on temp gauge. Easy if you have a expansion tank every morning. I also check stern gland for a few mins when finished for the day, 1 drip about every minute TB suggested so good excuse for a cool beer rather than other chores, sounds a good reason to me.