PSD Cold Start Blue Smoke

[Rollingrock]

So, its no surprise that my F250 is sitting a lot more than its driving event though I try to drive it once per month for a day or so. 

I noticed while camping this past weekend, the truck was really blowing blue smoke at cold start up, went away once warm.   

Wondering if I should go ahead and change the oil, only 1500 miles or so on current oil but it has been in there for at least 5-6 months.

Will change the fuel filters too...but the question is, should I be concerned with the blue smoke?

[Too Stroked]

JP,

Blue smoke is almost always from burning oil. We have a couple in our fleet that put out some pretty good plumes of it - but they all have well over 100,000 hard miles on them. On a gas motor, blue smoke only at startup  is generally a sign of leaking valve seals. On a diesel, I'm not sure. I'll be at the shop tomorrow working on a few of them - wounded from 2 solid days of plowing in single digit temps. I'll ask our mechanic about it and get back to you.

If you want my quick opinion though, it's probably terminal and you should just buy a new one. 

[Rollingrock]

Not buying a new truck

 

My deisel guy said could be a few different things...since the truck is sitting lot, could be old fuel.   could also be turbo seals leaking until warm...or it could be using oil...

He told me to go ahead and change the oil since it has been 5 months or so. 

I also have new fuel filters to put in.   

Thanks for asking your guy.

[Too Stroked]

JP,

I checked with our mechanic today and he had a little different take on things. He thinks you have an injector going bad. They're powered by oil pressure (about 25,000 PSI) and when they go bad, the oil can leak past the injector and into a cylinder. That would cause a puff of blue smoke on startup when it burns off with diesel fuel. He said if it's not real bad, don't worry too much. (You ought to see some of ours smoke on cold startup.) When the injector does go fully bad, replace it then because they're kind of pricey.

Hope that helps. Remember, 100% correct diagnosis over the internet is dangerous.

Tom

[Rollingrock]

Thanks Tom, I think I may have a little bit bigger problem on my hands.

Today I changed the oil...and noticed some coolant residue on the degas bottle.

I did recently have my water pump and t stat replaced so I wonder if that was just left over coolant from putting it back in...i don't recall seeing it....i do know that my rig is still running a tad hot when pulling...I can see my coolant temps upwards of 220+ and oil temp 5 degrees delta.   The max delta I have seen is 10 degrees between the two.

I will keep an eye on it.   But I sure hate the thought of another head gasket and body off.   

[Too Stroked]

Changing the water pump and / or thermostat shouldn't allow coolant to mix with your oil as far as I know. The two systems are separate - unless something is wrong. Keep a close eye on it. Oh, and running a 6.0 liter hot is not something I'd recommend.

We just did a bunch of work on our 2006 (with a bit over 100 grand on the clock) this morning. The guy who drives it flogs the living snot out of it. We pieced the plow back together, put in a new Fan Clutch and some sensors and when I left, it was in the process of getting two new batteries. You should have seen the plow. It was almost criminal what the kid did to it. And when it rolled into the shop last night, the engine air intake - as well as most of the grill - had almost 2" of snow and frozen solid ice coving everything. Think that might have caused an overheat? We had to let it thaw overnight before we could do anything. Words fail me.

[Rollingrock]

the PCM is supposed to command the fan at 100% at 220 degrees, I can say I don't hear mine. 

Gonna ask my tech to hook it up to the software and see what is going on...maybe in the next few weeks..i got a couple of hell weeks of travel coming.