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Travelling along today and all is fine. Engine had been running for an hour so without a problem. Then it slowed. It sounded as if something was caught on the prop - which it wasn't. It continued to slow to until it just cut out, all in a matter of 10 seconds. Now nothing. It turns over but never even thinks about starting. Puffs of white smoke come out of the exhaust. Diesel is full. Cracked a feed to an injector and fuel is pumping out there OK. Oil and air filter fine .....

 

I am flumuxed. Any thoughts?

 

(It is a Perkins and usually magnificant.)

 

 

 

 

Edited by rgriffiths
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Had exactly these symptoms on my last shareboat.

 

Found the fuel tank had a lot of water in it. Once drained of 25 litres of water and the fuel filter changed it started and ran perfectly.

 

Turned out the boatyard where it was based that year had an above ground tank, had never heard of draining condensation from the tank or water finding paste!

 

Needless we moved boatyards PDQ.

Edited by cuthound
Spillung
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The vast majority of probs with any diesel is fuel unless it stops with a big bang - then its something else. Its clearly pumping something but it might not be flammable diesel. When I had a problem with water in fuel I ended up getting a couple of bits of plastic pipe and a bottle of perfect diesel from a garage and changing the filter on the engine (You might not have one) then bleeding it and running it for a while just to confirm that the thing woul;d actually work. Even then it took a while to purge the crap fuel out of the pump and pipework. My guess is that that will sort it. Then all you have to do is clean the tank...... Good Luck!

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It is most likely a fuel issue, but as you have fuel getting to the injectors and white smoke then this does suggest that fuel is getting injected.

A loss of compression is another possibility but its really hard to see how this could happen so suddenly and without suitable bad noises.

Another possibility is that the injection timing has moved. I know nothing about your engine but is there any way that the drive to the injection pump can come loose?

 

but......don't think about these unusual possibilities till you are 100% sure clean fuel is getting to the injection pump.

 

............Dave

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1 hour ago, Bee said:

The vast majority of probs with any diesel is fuel unless it stops with a big bang - then its something else. Its clearly pumping something but it might not be flammable diesel. When I had a problem with water in fuel I ended up getting a couple of bits of plastic pipe and a bottle of perfect diesel from a garage and changing the filter on the engine (You might not have one) then bleeding it and running it for a while just to confirm that the thing woul;d actually work. Even then it took a while to purge the crap fuel out of the pump and pipework. My guess is that that will sort it. Then all you have to do is clean the tank...... Good Luck!

A friend of mine has just had his fuel " Polished " for the grand sum of £900.

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1 minute ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

And I bloody BET the tank still has a tonne of crud stuck to the bottom. 

 

Bluddy racket, fuel 'polishing'.

I agree. He has in fairness two bigish tanks on his bote but the bloke seemed to do a good job removing and cleaning and a few filter changes of his equipment but still a fair whack of money innitt?

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3 hours ago, rgriffiths said:

Travelling along today and all is fine. Engine had been running for an hour so without a problem. Then it slowed. It sounded as if something was caught on the prop - which it wasn't. It continued to slow to until it just cut out, all in a matter of 10 seconds. Now nothing. It turns over but never even thinks about starting. Puffs of white smoke come out of the exhaust. Diesel is full. Cracked a feed to an injector and fuel is pumping out there OK. Oil and air filter fine .....

 

I am flumuxed. Any thoughts?

 

(It is a Perkins and usually magnificant.)

 

 

 

 

 

I had a BMC 1.5 cut out on me in a hire boat something like 25 years ago. The owner came out and removed the fuel filter, it was full of black slime (diesel bug!). He replaced the filter, bled the system and and all was fine. Just a thought.

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I had this 2 years ago, on a Perkins 4108M. Finally nailed it down to a leaking flexi hose on the inlet to the pump. As it was sucking air, there was no telltale fuel leak except when I caught it just as it cut out. I was able to bleed and prime it, but when running it sucked some air, which eventually rose and air locked the agglomerator.

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2 hours ago, mrsmelly said:

A friend of mine has just had his fuel " Polished " for the grand sum of £900.

I suspect a few fuel polishers do a good job but some are just a con. Most diesels are partly "self polishing" as they suck fuel through the filters and return some back to the tank. To do a proper job needs a pipe that sucks fuel off the very bottom of the tank and has enough flow and pressure to really stir up the crap to get it into the filters. Some polishers do appear to catch a lot of water and crap which is good, but a hand pump and suitable copper pipe might do this almost as well.

 

A good self employed tradesman can earn £300-£400  in a day, a few (like our mtb) have really uniquel skills so can earn a whole lot more, but most fuel polishers are unskilled or semi-skilled people who have purchased a pump and filters and so £900 sounds a bit over the top.

 

...........Dave

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Like others I have had similar due to water and slime in the diesel.  Every few months now I put a plastic tube tied to a piece of dowel into the tank and syphon off the bottom of the tank. Often it is clean but other times I can get a few litres of water and some black slime.

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Having found some truly heavy and hard to distrurb carp in the bottom of one or two of my own tanks, I simply don't believe sucking diesel out and squirting it back in under pressure or even just fast is gonna lift even 1% of it. 

 

The counter argument of course is that if pumping the diesel through really fast doesn't lift the carp, then it isn't doing any harm, presents no risk and might as well stay there. 

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I had a similar problem back in the mists of time. Engine would be fine for hours then randomly stop. Always started again perfectly and run again for hours or days before the next random stop.

 

Eventually I noticed the engine stop button was about hip level, and I occasionally lent on it. DUHHH.......

 

 

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The next step is to found out how the water got into the tank.

 

Three obvious possibilities:

 

1. The tank filler cap. If the tank has a flush fitting cap level with the deck, as opposed to a crew off cap on an upstand, then the nitrile rubber seal has failed. Replace with a new one every couple of year to prevent a recurrence.

 

2. Condensation. If the tank is left partly full during cold weather, condensation will form on the exposed surfaces and drop to the bottom of the tank. Unless periodically removed (pump or siphon out from the bottom of the tank periodically) it will eventually rise to the level of the engine supply pipe and stop the engine. If possible, keep the tank full to the brim during the winter months.

 

3. The water came from the supplier of you last fuel purchase - only likely if it was from an above ground tank and the quantity of water in the tank was significant. Tell the suplly to dip the tank with water finding paste and if water is present to remove it from his tank. Good suppliers will do this periodically.

Edited by cuthound
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I can't be sure of how it got into the tank but most probably condensation over time. I try and keep the tank full, epsecially at this time of year. But draining any water from the diesel water separator on a more regular basis would have stopped this from happening. Lesson learned,

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12 hours ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

Having found some truly heavy and hard to distrurb carp in the bottom of one or two of my own tanks, I simply don't believe sucking diesel out and squirting it back in under pressure or even just fast is gonna lift even 1% of it. 

 

The counter argument of course is that if pumping the diesel through really fast doesn't lift the carp, then it isn't doing any harm, presents no risk and might as well stay there. 

And when you do eventually get them out, remember they're definitely not for the pan.....

 

 

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