white smoke and flame

Hello everyone! First time poster needs some help.

The other day I got on the highway, drove about a mile truck is in a limp mode due to code p242f high ash accumulation, got off was waiting at the intersection when the white smoke, lots of it, started coming out of the exhaust. Immediatelly pullled over got out went to the exhaust and saw smoke and flame coming out of the exhaust pipe. Closer to the engine exhaust was so hot it was actually melting looked like a fireball. Thinking it was going to catch on fire I shut the truck off, waited about 15 minutes started it again and had no similar or any issues with the truck for couple days of work.

Truck is 2007 dodge sprinter 2500 with almost 200 k. Previous owner put the wrong oil in it for years I changed the oil to mobil 1 esp and also what I did is out one can of Sea Foam in the tank to clean injectors and what not. Trying to figure out what happened or what caused it?
thanks for any help or suggestions!

A guess.

It sounds to me like it went into a DPF regeneration cycle. When that happens the glow plugs are enabled and extra fuel is added to raise temperatures to burn out the DPF so the accumulated junk is made basically into powder. If the previous owner was using non-low ash spec oil then there is probably quite a build-up of residue.

Now that you had that incident if you are now running normally I would wait to see what happens on the next regen. My guess is that next time it will be much less dramatic. vic

kanidja,
Since you had the code for "high ash accumulation" (what scanner did you use to get this code, or did you have it scanned at an authorized Mercedes/Freightliner dealer shop with the MB SDS Star Diagnostics System) most likely the DPF was "regenerating" and it was burning all the gunk and junk out of the DPF. This is a normal occurrence every 700-1000 miles, but since the high ash oil was used, your accumulation of ash/junk/gunk may still be a little high and you get the smoke and some flame from the stuff in the DPF actually burning off.
You shut it off and that pretty much interrupted the normal DPF regeneration cycle.
Had you simply kept on driving, and maybe even manually downshifted to increase RPMs (2700-3200) and the exhaust flow, the regeneration cycle would have been completely normal.
Yes, it gets extremely hot in the DPF area of the exhaust system when a regeneration is occurring.
If it continues to happen, the MB SDS system at the dealers can be used to determine if the DPF cycles are happening at the correct frequency and if they are burning off all the bad stuff inside your DPF.
If you recently added the Sea Foam, that may have in some way contributed to the smoke/fire. No additives are really needed.
Hope this helps,
Roger

+ 2 on Sea Foam maybe not the best fuel additive for a MB diesel since it is naphtha, alcohol and a light oil :

http://seafoamsales.com.previewc40.carrierzone.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/MSDS_seafoam_EN.pdf

First of all want to thank everyone for any help and input really appreciated. I am a fedex contractor bought a route and the truck came with the route. Needles to say we do lots of stop and go and lots of idling but not too much highway driving. The truck has been in limp mode since the day I got it but since i can pretty much avoid highways been able to use it for work.

On the bottom of the truck there are kind of like two pots ...i am guesing one of those is dpf... trying to find some diagram for the manifold to figure out which part was actually so hot it was gloving and parts of it fell to the ground (on the bottom of the truck it was the pot closer to the engine maybe catalytic converter? Have no idea)...at that point I shut if off and grabbed the fire extuingisher..I was hoping it would regenerate but was not expecting anything like that.

Scanner I used was just generic scanner gave me two codes p242f and p0107 barometric pressure probably map sensor. Delaer is so backed up due to 4 of july.

Nex thing I am going to do is clean the egr valve and then hop on the highway to try and get the truck to do another regen driving 2500-3500 rpms. Highway driving si something delarship recommended when i called to set up an appointment. He pretty much said that is what we do for high ash accumulation.
Even though check engine light is on the regen will still occur?

No more sea foam.

If anyone knows a good sprinter specialist in Arizona please let me know.

Thanks again!