Broken rockers... or so I thought

tomasnc · **Posted:** Fri May 01, 2015 8:52 pm

Here's an interesting tale.

My CRD had very low power. Switched turbo from spare engine. No improvement so I order in rocker and get ready to do this repair along with timing belt on a vehicle the I bought second hand from a guy on this forum.

Anyway, I get ready to install the alignment pins on the intake & exhaust cams and I'm only able to get either one or the other pin installed. What further adds insult to injury is that when I turn the engine over I am not able to complete a rotation of the crank :shock:

After consulting with Geordi, I removed the valve cover expecting to find multiple broken rocker arms. To my amazement there are no broken rockers and all rollers are free.
I removed the glow plugs and they are intact too.
I ran out of time this afternoon so I will remove the rockers and hopefully find a dropped valve.
This engine has been opened up in the past. I had a bear of a time pulling the injectors too.
I was planning on finding messed up rockers and that was it. So much for expecting A and getting B.
As I told Geordi, my first CRD had plenty of power. The car was always lacking in power and I'm beginning to think it was very slightly out of time from the day it had its first 100K timing belt job.

My plans are to remove the head tomorrow and see what is going on.

What is a complete puzzle to me is that this engine was running when I turned it off. Albeit being low on power. Not being able to fully bar turn the engine over has me stumped.

Stay tuned for updates.

Tom

tomasnc · **Posted:** Sat May 02, 2015 6:58 pm

[img][IMG]http://images.tapatalk-cdn.com/15/05/02/15f70df65000054737ff2f84e3ee2c21.jpg[/img][/IMG]

So the head is off. I cleaned all surfaces and re-attached the head. The engine rotates completely and I must have had some carbon deposits keeping the engine from rotating.

Now the fun begins.

Mountainman · **Posted:** Sun May 03, 2015 2:39 am

That beats my evening, I couldn't bar mine over because I didn't pull the cam pins out :ROTFL:

Good thing I didn't put much pressure on it...

I don't think that a piece of carbon would put up that much of a fight, would it? hmm, it seems to me the carbon would crush under the pressure

tomasnc · **Posted:** Sun May 03, 2015 3:46 am

Mountainman wrote:

That beats my evening, I couldn't bar mine over because I didn't pull the cam pins out :ROTFL:

Good thing I didn't put much pressure on it...

I don't think that a piece of carbon would put up that much of a fight, would it? hmm, it seems to me the carbon would crush under the pressure

I was expecting to to see something bad. I drove this car running into my shop so I knew that there was no metal on metal knocking occurring.
This car has sat in my shop for nearly a year and I can not really figure out what was causing the interference. I pulled the head and cleaned up all surfaces and re-installed the head with 8 bolts. I then turned the engine over and it worked like a charm :roll:

Weirder things have happened.

Remember that I was expecting to find broken rocker arms. The rockers are perfect with 132,000 miles. I bought this car and did a very short test drive. I knew it felt under powered but never thought much about it. My first CRD was purchased new and had lots of power. I assumed this used car was somewhat warn.

Line up pins... I tried to get my pins inserted a few days ago and could only get one or the other inserted. I could not get both pins inserted My point is that this engine was out of time by one tooth and it would run all be it with less than optimal power. Again, I just accepted this as OK. WRONG.

The guy I bought this car from said he had the TB changed and upon opening up the cover it has been worked on the messed up to. There are "white-out" mark all over everywhere............

This darn car will rank first place in most head aches :-)r

Now it's time to get it put back together.

Mountainman · **Posted:** Sun May 03, 2015 12:19 pm

That's a good reminder for people that if they have an underpowered CRD, that they might want to try and pin the cams after they've checked all of the other obvious stuff.
At least you'll have a major power increase.

The broken rockers I've seen made a nasty knocking sound under hard acceleration, but I'm sure whether an exhaust or intake went first...

Mountainman · **Posted:** Sun May 03, 2015 12:21 pm

I can't believe that whoever set up that timing didn't turn the engine 720 and verify!

tomasnc · **Posted:** Sun May 03, 2015 1:44 pm

Mountain,

Me neither. I had totaled my first CRD and was in a rush to replace this car. I found this second CRD on this forum. The guy was as honest as he could have been. He knew nothing about the complexities of TB replacement on this engine and his mechanic obviously knew just a tad more than he did. I drove 3 hours to meet this kid in a Cracker Barrel and after a short test drive I deemed this car OK has we swapped cash for keys. Like I have mentioned before the power was off but I would have never thought it was timing related.

Mountainman · **Posted:** Sun May 03, 2015 2:29 pm

Well, at least it wasn't a couple of bashed up valves or worse :rockon:

Oh dang! It does make sense that carbon would do that being that the valves were closer to the piston than they should have been... One tooth out probably put the valve dangerously close to piston. That's probably what you and Geordi already though of

tomasnc · **Posted:** Sun May 03, 2015 2:36 pm

This is the build up around 3 of the four injectors. Pulling these was nothing short of a miracle. I used a forklift as a lever on pulling the rear most injector.

Mountainman · **Posted:** Sun May 03, 2015 3:08 pm

Yeah, that seems to been standard factory issue :furious:

Luckily I got a good deal on the Miller tools. They make the stubborn ones come out with ease.

What I really hate it trying to get the bore cleaned up properly! I'm still trying to figure out a better brush for getting the bottom clean where the copper washer seals. The shotgun brushes work ok.

Have you found anything that dissolves the deposits well?

geordi · **Posted:** Sun May 03, 2015 4:23 pm

The 12 gauge shotgun mop (the wool brush) is the best thing to clean the injector bores and the seat - and brake cleaner. You cannot use too much. Just drown the mop in it, push it in and go to town. Lather, rinse and repeat as often as needed until the entire bore is shiny clean.

Mountainman · **Posted:** Sun May 03, 2015 7:52 pm

geordi wrote:

The 12 gauge shotgun mop (the wool brush) is the best thing to clean the injector bores and the seat - and brake cleaner. You cannot use too much. Just drown the mop in it, push it in and go to town. Lather, rinse and repeat as often as needed until the entire bore is shiny clean.

That's right, you told me that a year ago, but I forgot. Thanks again!

Broken rockers... or so I thought

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