Clacky 2006

Axiom

Mike from Florida Van Man
First post, been lurking for a while, please be patient :)

We have a 2006 HC 140" with a supposedly rebuilt engine that we just got running again. It sat for a long time in many pieces, drained all the yuck out of it and put it back together with original injectors, no start. 5 remanufactured injectors, starts right up. Here's a video of the very first time we fired it up: https://youtu.be/IImfsKYXYMY

If this really is a rebuilt engine (which the general overall cleanliness and clean oil when checking lead us to believe it is), then I'm about halfway through the 1,000 mile break in period. I was hoping that at this point it would quiet down a lot, in fact it sounds like an older diesel extremely clacky. I don't mind it, but I know it's strange for a Sprinter. We have one with 430k that still purrs and one revived this year with 299k that also purrs really nicely.

This is an up to date video on what it sounds like at startup, and idle. The audio cuts out a little and if the link doesn't work, skip to 4:00 in: https://youtu.be/e1b_D6bEGNI?t=240

I'm quite worried about this clackiness and my reading indicates that this could fuel injection related, like an injector getting stuck open or a bad high pressure fuel pump. After running it for 30 miles, I noticed small fuel puddles (not black) in front of cylinders 1 & 2.

Something I believe to be related to this problem is the fact that the engine "surges" or revs up to about 1000rpm when it fires and starts. This doesn't seem normal and it makes quite a loud sound inside the engine compartment. Could this be fuel leaking from an injector into the cylinder, and then firing when I start the engine? Or a sign of something else? Plan on buying a compression tester soon so we can at least verify that's good...but I have a feeling that's not where we should be looking.

Thanks so much for the help, not expecting an accurate diagnosis but just hoping to bounce these thoughts around some much more knowledgeable folks...

PS I love the size of this van, got used to driving a SHC 158" and it's hard to go back to such a long van

 
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Midwestdrifter

Engineer In Residence
A surge after start is not normal. Does the exhaust pulse or surge at idle? black smoke? Any signs it has been tuned, or had funky "power" modules connected? Obviously hard to tell, but excessive oil consumption would be something to watch.

have you checked the fuel filter? If it has failed, or the HP pump is failing, it will throw lots of crap into the fuel.

Where did you source your injectors. There are plenty of "rebuilt" injectors where they just clean them and toss on new nozzles. No actual testing performed.

You should also consider checking for high pressure fuel leaks. Caution high pressure fuel spray will cut through your skin and can kill. Use a piece of cardboard to check for spray when the engine is running.
 

Axiom

Mike from Florida Van Man
A surge after start is not normal. Does the exhaust pulse or surge at idle? black smoke? Any signs it has been tuned, or had funky "power" modules connected? Obviously hard to tell, but excessive oil consumption would be something to watch.
No black smoke, and it seems to be holding its oil well and keeping clean. I will continue to monitor this.

have you checked the fuel filter? If it has failed, or the HP pump is failing, it will throw lots of crap into the fuel.
It got a new fuel filter, oil filter, and oil change before we started our road test but it's worth taking another look at it considering how long the engine sat. Our HPFP is questionable and is something on our check list of things to test. The HPFP that came with the van was junk and wasn't able to build a high enough pressure to start. This HPFP was able to build proper starting pressure but I haven't monitored it since.

Where did you source your injectors. There are plenty of "rebuilt" injectors where they just clean them and toss on new nozzles. No actual testing performed.

You should also consider checking for high pressure fuel leaks. Caution high pressure fuel spray will cut through your skin and can kill. Use a piece of cardboard to check for spray when the engine is running.
They were eBay "remanufactured" injectors, against best judgement we mostly did this to keep costs down since we weren't entirely sure the van would run. Now that it is running it might be time to retire these injectors to "testing only". Thanks for the thorough response, I'll keep updating this thread as I investigate further.
 
I read each injectors have numbers on them, and with the code tool your suppose to program them into the cpu. There values.
 

Axiom

Mike from Florida Van Man
I read each injectors have numbers on them, and with the code tool your suppose to program them into the cpu. There values.
There's some more confusion on our end. We have a version of CarSoft MB II but we are unable to input custom injector codes. It has a list of 5 and we can only pick those with no option to input custom codes. That's been in the back of our mind since we put the injectors in but neither of us think it would it cause it to do the radical things it's doing. We also have a CarSoft & iCarsoft dedicated devices but neither of those still let us input custom injector codes.
 

Axiom

Mike from Florida Van Man
The sound is about right.
I should try and get a better sound clip, when it cold starts too so you can hear what happens when it fires and how uneven it sounds for the first 10 seconds. Plan on doing a leak down test this week and also testing our fuel rail for leaks.
 

markxengineering

Active member
I would not expect a cheap scan tool to be capable to code injectors, at least I have never heard of it. I paid the dodge dealer something like $100 to do it before I got a C3 Star Xentry clone tool from alibaba, which can do it as well.
I would retire those injectors, fix the fuel leak, then re-evaluate.
 

ECU

2006 T1n 118 Sprinter
Would the issue of rough at start be an issue of glow plugs? Or fuel filter?
 

Axiom

Mike from Florida Van Man
Would the issue of rough at start be an issue of glow plugs? Or fuel filter?
The glow plugs are only there to heat the cylinder before cold start, and considering it hasn't been below 80ºF in Florida these past few months I doubt that's my issue.

I would not expect a cheap scan tool to be capable to code injectors, at least I have never heard of it. I paid the dodge dealer something like $100 to do it before I got a C3 Star Xentry clone tool from alibaba, which can do it as well.
I would retire those injectors, fix the fuel leak, then re-evaluate.
The software looks something like this, I'll try to get some screenshots of the injector classification screen.


We are going to look into the C3 as we maintain many other vans and would find it beneficial. But I would expect that injector coding wouldn't make a huge difference anyway and wouldn't even matter considering they are remanufactured? Either way I would really like to get 5 NEW injectors in this to totally eliminate that as a factor.
 

markxengineering

Active member
I do believe that injector coding matters and would not drive a van very far before having it performed, but I think I'm in the minority on that opinion. Idle fuel amount injected per shot can vary injector to injector (brand new) 25% without coding. With coding, this is reduced to half. Info obtained from Bosch presentation on the subject that I saw through my ex-employment.

I highly recommend C3. Here is the description of the one I got with Alibaba
"BEST D630+MB STAR C3+SSD with mb c3 2015.07 software All New red Relay and five Strong Copper Cable star c3 "
 

autostaretx

Erratic Member
The CarSoft software is what was sold by Dr Andy as the DAD.

Yes, it can code the injectors. (i haven't *done* it, but it's in there)

InjectorCoding2006.jpg

(for the OM647 (2004-2006) ... if you have an OM612 (2003 and older), say so.

--dick
 
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Axiom

Mike from Florida Van Man
The CarSoft software is what was sold by Dr Andy as the DAD.

Yes, it can code the injectors. (i haven't *done* it, but it's in there)

View attachment 117778

(for the OM647 (2004-2006) ... if you have an OM612 (2003 and older), say so.

--dick
I can get to that screen but where do I **manually** type in my numbers? I can pick from a preset list but cant actually input anything. The numbers on my injectors dont match the ones in the list. Currently the van reads all 5 injectors as “Not known”
 

autostaretx

Erratic Member
I can get to that screen but where do I **manually** type in my numbers? I can pick from a preset list but cant actually input anything. The numbers on my injectors dont match the ones in the list. Currently the van reads all 5 injectors as “Not known”
I have always wondered about that... the drop-list only provides a few codes to select from.
The OM612 version of the process uses single-digit numbers (1-9 kind'a thing).

This might be a good question to ask Dr Andy ... 864-623-9110

.. and then tell us the magic.

(since they're such bizarre numbers, it's impossible (without deep Bosch knowledge) to guess even which "menu" number might be sufficiently close to a new injector's number.)

The "not known" you're seeing means that the ECU has been programmed with numbers other than the list ... one would have hoped that CarSoft would have at least allowed for "list expansion" by any found value.

--dick
 

markxengineering

Active member
I cannot answer your first question, but the van cannot read the injectors, you must type the info in. Although, it might be a good future upgrade for ECU's to read injectors directly, as the technology has been around for a long time with sensors and data acquisition (TEDS = transducer electronic datasheet)

Edit: didn't see Dick's reply : )
 

Axiom

Mike from Florida Van Man
Well I guess it's time for the update post!

We bought new 5 new injectors and a compression test kit + Miller 9543 injector hole adapter. When we did our compression test, all 5 cylinders were low but they were all within +/- 3 PSI of eachother (all around 220psi). So in terms of relative compression, we'll call that a win and attribute it to either a ****ty battery (we had it plugged in and charging) or a weak starter (which still starts the van very quickly and reliably). Initially the new injectors didn't change the sound much and certainly didn't solve the surging problem but it was peace of mind. I've driven it about 20 miles and then today I started it to move and wow! No loud vroom and surging up to 1100rpm on startup. Starts and revs right to around 700rpm and sounds much better. Still pretty clacky, but at least very even. So I think I'll call that a win for this van? I'll get some cold start sound clips within the next few days.

I would still really like to code the injectors and I wrote down the codes I have, I guess I'll have to call Dr A and ask him how to type in injector codes. Thanks again for all your help and suggestions guys.
 

lindenengineering

Well-known member
NO
Almost as low as a gasser !
:thumbdown:

A normal turbo engine in good condition is 400 psi at cranking .
MB minimum pressure at cranking is 320 psi ( to light a fire.)

I tested a misfiring Smoking Joe Sprinter yesterday #1 cylinder showed 220 psi. The rest were at or around 400 !
So what do you deduce was the issue with #1 cylinder?
Dennis
 

Axiom

Mike from Florida Van Man
A normal turbo engine in good condition is 400 psi at cranking .
MB minimum pressure at cranking is 320 psi ( to light a fire.)

I tested a misfiring Smoking Joe Sprinter yesterday #1 cylinder showed 220 psi. The rest were at or around 400 !
So what do you deduce was the issue with #1 cylinder?
Dennis
We are deducing that bad a bad injector (before swap, engine sound stayed consistent when shutting off injector 1, but got worse shutting off any other injector) was either leaking or getting stuck when trying to fire thus causing the rough idle and probably most of my other issues. When we compression tested, we pulled and tested through the injector holes since we didnt want to warm the engine up with the old “remanned” injectors in it. But all 5 cylinders were around 220psi which we are attributing to a slower cranking speed caused by a weak starter or even a slightly crappy diesel compression test. The van starts and runs within about 2 cranks of the engine (very quickly). Before I go on my trip late October, we’ll pull the glowplugs and make sure they’re good and do the “Sprinter proper” compression test.

I should also mention no smoke at all. If all 5 cylinders were actually only putting out 220psi when the engine wants to run, would it even be able to? 320psi minimum to light tells me that if i were actually that low on all 5 this engine wouldnt be running at all and i’d be writing a very different update message :/
 
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Axiom

Mike from Florida Van Man
Hello all~

I'm bumping this thread again because I've got some concerns about this van. I decided not to take it on the trip but still tried to prepare it as if I was going.

5 new injectors went in and that smoothed out the idle A LOT. Just two days ago, we got our C3 in and after much trouble getting it to connect, I got it connected to the van and successfully coded all 5 injectors. That smoothed out the idle some more.
However, the clack/tick/knock is still there and part of me feels like I just shouldn't drive the van anymore until I figure it out. Out of 3 vans, it is by FAR the loudest. Here is a video starting the van (you can hear a womp after it fires, this was the surge that we were concerned about before that still hasn't gone away).

Here's a video of warm start and warm idle:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdbGqP_3ZTI

Van has plenty of power and drives great. The only known problem left to fix is the exhaust leak causing an occasional shut off of the turbo which sometimes lights the CEL (2359-001: Turbo Charge Pressure too low, not surprised.)




1 problem still remains and that is a minor exhaust leak between the back of the turbo and the downpipe. However, I don't think that would contribute this much to the noise. Could this be a high pressure fuel pump? Fuel rail solenoid? Is the engine toasted? User ECU said previously the sound is about right but our two 2004s purr very quietly (they sound like cats!!!!) and then the 2005 has a slight clack but still purrs and is quiet.
 

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