Glow plugs knackered
- Thread starter Puds
- Start date
TNStalker19
Well-Known Member
So now it’s not cranking at all?? Starter making no noise?
Puds
Well-Known Member
Starter makes a vague effort then nothing at all.
TNStalker19
Well-Known Member
First thing I would be checking would be good battery voltage and CCA of the battery.
A simple voltage check may not give you enough information, battery still may be reading 12v but the CCA due to the cold temperatures might not be giving the starter enough umffff
Malxwal
Well-Known Member
Yup, cold weather wipes out a weak battery. Defo worth a jump start off another motor (give it 10 minutes or so with leads attached before trying).
Pals Hilux other week, five minutes if a jump off my wee Skoda and it roared into life. Struggled to start next morning, garage replaced both batteries (ouch).
Pals Hilux other week, five minutes if a jump off my wee Skoda and it roared into life. Struggled to start next morning, garage replaced both batteries (ouch).
Chances off al four glow plugs having gone simultaneously are zero. You can lose one and engine will still start, rattle a bit until failed cylinder gets going. Even lose two and in summer will maybe still start, lump badly (depending which cylinders are affected.) until it gets going properly.
Cold finds out such weaknesses.
My guess is simply your battery is knackered, which could also account for starter turning a few chugs but then disengaging, from the ring gear due to low voltage and spinning futility, not actually turning the engine..Potentially also damaging the starter pinion and flywheel teeth.
Glowplugs fail open circuit, so can be checked with a multimeter, once you have disconnected them from the power rail, so you can test them individually.
The current to the plug power harness is supplied either from a simple relay, or a more sophisticated transistorised ECU which can modulate the power to them, flat out to get hot then back off to not over-heat/ burn them out.. The dashboard light does not tell you anything about the health of the plugs, it is simply there to tell you how long to leave them on before trying to crank the engine, based on some temperature sensor elsewhere in the engine. Colder temperature, plugs stay on longer. hot engine, no need for plugs. It gets more sophisticated for stop-start systems that sometimes keep the plugs tickled up if the engine is not properly hot, but your old truck probably has no such sophistication.
Blowing hot air into the intake, or a squirt of "easy start" (ether) into it works well for basic non turbo non electronic ECU controlled stuff but is a recipe for disaster if tried on more modern engines.
Summary: Try a new battery, fully charged.
If still no joy, check the power rail to the plugs is getting full battery voltage whilst heating up until the light goes out. If that is good, disconnect power rail from plugs and measure each one for open circuit (fail). Only then consider replacing a failed plug (can be a nightmare if they are seized in)).
Oh, your problem might also be a diesel injection problem, worn injectors, clogged fuel filter, waxed up summer diesel in cold weather, water or air in diesel, etc. etc. Stuff that seems to run ok in Summer can soon be found out during a cold snap. You surely have not let the tank run empty risking all sorts of problems ?
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iain b
Well-Known Member
I’d recommend "gas oil". Did the job on mine. Every day for a week then very carefully undo them. It’s an easy job UNLESS it splits. Then you’ll have problems. Good luck. There’s a lot on utube have a good look on there.
That wont fix anything, and more likely ruin some very expensive things, mass airflow sensor being just one. Can also blow the airbox to bits.All that a diesel needs to function is good compression, good fuel injection, and functioning glow plugs to get it going when cold. Even then they don't really need glow plugs if you are prepared to crank them for ages and risk loads of diesel washing away the oil from the bores, getting into the sump oil, filthing up the catalyst and DPF etc. etc. A fit diesel should start first time every time, if it doesn't something is wrong. A shagged battery is the most likely cause, they do not last forever and cold finds them out PDQ.Christ !!! This has really spiralled out of control AGAIN . Hi puds , if you need to start it just pop down to your nearest motofacter and get a can of aro start , give it a little squirt in to the air box and she’ll soon come to life.
Charge the battery.
This weather that is what Mr Ockham would do.
For all the glow pugs to fail simultaneously is unlikely...a poor connection or duff solenoid the triggers them all is more likely.
My old Merlo with no glow plugs would not start last weekend, even with a fully charged battery...well wriggled contact jump leads off the Discovery spun it over so much faster it started immediately.
This weather that is what Mr Ockham would do.
For all the glow pugs to fail simultaneously is unlikely...a poor connection or duff solenoid the triggers them all is more likely.
My old Merlo with no glow plugs would not start last weekend, even with a fully charged battery...well wriggled contact jump leads off the Discovery spun it over so much faster it started immediately.
enfieldspares
Well-Known Member
Yes. When I was doing nights on air cargo 6pm to 4am that's what started to fail on my petrol Mazda 2. The battery was worn out and worked OK in warm weather but come December through to January it was "found out" by the cold and whereas a charge would top it up the thing wouldn't hold the charge so needed charging every twenty-four hours. I changed it!
Pete1774
Well-Known Member
All glow plugs at once??? Have you checked the fuse?
my first reply on here bear with me / two glow plugs out no start one will couch and splutter to life you need an 8mm and 12mm socket 8mm to remove the connecting rail / wire and 12 mm the plug removal once removed refit its simple on the top of the engine you will have parts that look like you bought you dont need a garage if in doubt get in touch you can have my number and ill walk you through by the way charge your battery first attempted starts failed as not running engine battery depleted charge the battery new plugs you will be golden im not good with the written word i hope this helps if in doubt pm your number and ill walk you
FFS. Get a new battery, charge it up fully (they won't necessarily be topped off from wherever you get it from, even if you can find one ATM)
Or try to jump it from something strong (not a petrol car, their batteries aren't sized to crank a 2l plus high compression diesel), but ordinary cheopo jump leads also wont hack it either. Mine are made from copper welding cable and serious clamps, can jump a 4.5 litre diesel lorry when used properly. A useful gift from a retired trucker.
There can also be problems with corroded or broken earth straps between engine, starter motor, engine to chassis, alternator battery etc. Just a tiny bit of resistance at any point can really degrade performance when e.g starter motors take hundreds of amps, a good alternator can push 90 or even 150 A (my truck has a big one). Then there are the battery terminal connections that can degrade unnoticeably if you don't look after them, simple stuff, take them off, clean them (wire brush etc.) then put them back together with something even as simple as vaseline to keep them from corrosion.
Your first thought was to diagnose glow plug multiple failure, seems improbable but might still have happened as well.
My little truck/camper (Fiat Ducato) has x3 120 AH batteries in parallel, each with well over 800 cold cranking Amps, it can pretty much jump anything if necessary.
BTW pay no attention to the little handheld digital battery testers that most service centres use. They are useless, merely give an instantaneous reading of peak current from any surface charge left on the battery. A proper test needs an olde fashioned tool with a huge dummy load which gets hot, analogue meter, applied for many seconds or even minutes. But they are too scary nowadays for such people to use, will actually find out poor batteries, more warranty claims, whereas the handheld digital things tell absolutely nothing, just peak current for a fraction of a second. Which even a completely duff battery might manage. They have no ability to soak up realistic cranking power for seconds or minutes, they'd probably explode in your hand if so. useless.
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Smellydog
Well-Known Member
I hope you haven't flooded it and it hydraulic locked up!
All modern diesel car engines need preheat. Don't try to start one with out glow plugs working. If you knew you lost a glow plug a while ago by a spluttering start up THAT was the time to have them checked for impedance and replaced.
All modern diesel car engines need preheat. Don't try to start one with out glow plugs working. If you knew you lost a glow plug a while ago by a spluttering start up THAT was the time to have them checked for impedance and replaced.
Malxwal
Well-Known Member
Commercial jump leads from an old 1.2 petrol Skoda onto a 3.0 Hilux, five minutes, first turn of the key and she fired up .....
This is the mitsubishi piece of s##t 4D56 engine if its a 2.5 but I'd say its sounding like a battery issue. These engines need the cranking speed to fire or they won't go, I'd avoid easy start with these engines if I were you as they're fragile when running normally let alone with a shot of ether detonating in it. The list of problems is pretty long though with these engines, I've spent (wasted) many years of my life running a company that built L200s into offroaders and modifying them. If it was one or 2 glow plugs it would cough and run rough until it warmed up, all glow plugs failing to heat would probably be a shot glow plug relay
