Hello to everyone on this forum' I was wondering if I could get some help here' I have a 1974 King International Harvester Firetruck and I was driving it up one of my hilly roads and it was low on Diesel fuel' It quite on me half way up the hill and now it won't start' I filled the tank up with diesel fuel but now it has air in the system. This truck does not have a primer pump and I can't see the fuel rails or injectors on this motor so I can't crack the lines at the injectors to let out the air. One thing I know I have against me is it's half way up a hill so the fuel tank is lower then the motor. What I have tried is sucking the fuel up to the two fuel filters and I tried pumping fuel up the line to the pump. I filled both fuel filters and cranked it over about 4 times and then fill the filters again and crank it over. I did this about 15 times' when I first crank it over it tries to start for a second and then just cranks. There has to be air still in the lines but I can't see the injectors to crack the line to let on the air. Is there an easier way to do it because I don't know what to do now. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks, Jack
Any way you can get some air in the tank and pressurize the system? Or post some pictures so someone can show you where to bleed ?
Hey DB2 thanks for the quick reply. I only have a couple pic's right now I will have to lift the cab back up to take some more.
A Detroit. These can be very problematic to start after being run out of fuel. I would fill the filters again if you can’t get an air pressure source to the unit. Then try and use some starting fluid to keep it running if it will fire. It all depends on how much of a panic you are to get it off of the road. Someone else will likely have a better suggestion
Those Detroits had unit fuel injectors, so there's not really any way to "prime" them like a mechanical pump. If it has a lot of air in it, you can set up a pump to circulate fuel through the supply side until you get no bubbles on the return side. If you have a good fuel supply and a good battery, it should prime up on its own. Maybe you lost the transfer pump.
when I turn it over a few times then I pull the fuel filter off and check the level it's half full so I fill it up again so the fuel is going somewhere. One question I have ' when I pull off the filter' drop it down to fill up the filter with fuel am I letting air back in the system or not' Just wondering If I'm wasting my time doing that. I have a full tank of fuel now and if I hook up a compressor to the fuel tank and pull off the return line and crank the engine will that fuel go threw the system and force the air out of the lines.
Detroit's will usually pop right off if you fill both filters with fuel. Your V6-71 should be no exception. Are the filters clean? Running the fuel tank on these old seldom run rigs, even close to dry, often picks up crap that ends up sloshing around in the bottom as it gets slopped of the side of the tank because of the splashing. Especially when they set without a lot of fuel in them. Change both filters and change the gaskets also. The second filter located after the pump runs at 60 PSI of pressure. The 60 PSI gear pump moves a lot of fuel but will also easily will suck air from around the first filter if the seal is not good. Often after filling them with fuel because of running dry, them old gaskets will not easily seal and they suck air.
I don't think the compressor will work because the supply and return both go to the tank. You'd have equal pressure on both.
You need to fill both filters to have half a chance. Are they spin on or cartridge. On the cartridge ones the pre-pump one is usually twice as big as the post gear pump one. The spin on ones are often close to the same size but they are also different with different part numbers. Do not mix them up and use a low pressure one after the fuel pump. Edit. Looked at pictures. Your sequence is tank in to first filter, out to gear pump, out of pump to 2nd filter, out of second filter to injectors. There is a 90 degree fitting on the block on the return. do not remove it trying to free up the flow. It is drilled an sized for your engine so it holds the right pressure for your injector size.
I have used a electric pump but it should not be necessary. I lost prime often on one once due to a bad fuel filter gasket. You could remove and plug the return line but don't put much over 3 to 5 lbs of air in your tank. A old inner tube with a hole cut out of it to clamp over the tank filler works well, Just put air in until the tube is partially expanded. Then you can bleed thru the filters and not have to try to hold air at the tank. If fuel comes out the secondary filter you should be good to go.
The truck run good before I ran it out of fuel' I checked the filters by dumping out the fuel and no crap come out of it so they looked pretty clean to me' When I fill the filters up I can't see any leaks and they did not leak before
Both filters are spin on' I have filled them about 15 times and it still won't start because there still must be air in the system.
Yours may very well be sealing but you will often not see a leak on the primary if it is sucking air in. The filter is not full when it sucks a little of the top so no fuel will be dripping unless its pressurized when full. Just trying to cover all the possibilities. I have also seen the rear seal go out at the drive end of the gear pump and then they suck air at that point. I don't feel that is your issue as your tank was very low. If you had a half tank of fuel that would have been worth checking.
Should fire right up. Getting any fire at all? The Detroits are one of the easiest Diesels to prime. Still saying sucking air. I'll see if I can alert Kshansen to this post. He is a real expert. EDIT: Corrected spelling on Kens handle.
When I first turn the key it fires and then just cranks and cranks and then when I let it sit for 2 minutes and turn it over again it fires and then just cranks' It fires each time I first crank it over
You might try loosening the outgoing line on the second filter and crank it over . If both filters are full it should in short order throw fuel like crazy with no air spurts. That will insure you got no air that far. you should be good to go then. If it gets pressure to fire the injectors your pump is good. You still have or are sucking air into the system. Are you sure it ran out of fuel in the tank or maybe just real low. Wondering if the fuel line collapsed internally and closed it up. another long shot. On a 74 International I had, it flattened out right where it laid across the frame for 35 years or so and cut my fuel supply off.
When I pull or unscrew the first filter to fill it back up where the tank line runs into the top of that filter' Since the truck is on a down grade and the filter is off will the fuel go back down the line into the tank again and then have air in that line. Just wondering
If you are in a pickle to get it off the road you could use a portable tank of some kind and set up at a higher elevation than the engine and let it gravity thru the filters. If you drive it that way you will probably need to route the return line to your can also because they return a lot of fuel and you will soon empty the tank. You might try that with supply only just to prime itand then hook the truck tank supply line back up.
I think I ran it out of fuel because I know it was low and I had fuel in the back of my other truck to put in it. I got in a rush and forgot to put the fuel in the truck and I moved it up the road and when up a hill. That was a mistake. I will never do this again run it so low because it to hard to get it going again.
I have never had that problem. The tank is normally lower than the engine. The filter should still stay full and be adequate to start it. They circulate way more fuel than they use.
It's on my own hilly road so that's ok but I would like to get it started so I can get it up on flat ground. If I put a bigger gas can higher then the motor and put the supply line to that fuel can it should get fuel but the air will still be in the lines' If I crack the second filter line will it let the air out when I crank the motor over
Ya but if I take the filters off and fill them with fuel am I letting air back in the system or is it ok to take the filters off and no air gets in the lines' Just a thought that I would like to know
Hey old-iron-habit Thanks for suggestions I will try a couple of them tomorrow right now it's 1:05 am so I will check back here before I go out in the morning to work on it to see if there is anything new posted. Thanks again
Yes to cracking the second filter out going line and crank it over. Bleed as much as you can by gravity first. It pumping fuel from the second filter out port to the injectors is only a matter of a few seconds. after you button it up.
Ken may chime in in the morning, he is in New York so its real late there. I'm a retired old fart that can't sleep much so am still up.
I work out side all day and then come on the computer after supper until about 2 or 3 am and back up about 8 but I will check back here before I go out.
One thing that kind of is catching my attention is I believe you are saying it will fire a couple times each time you try to start it and then it just cranks with no firing. Is that right? If that is the case then I would want to check something else out. I would want to check the emergency shut down flapper. In the picture below in the red circle you can just see the little lever that is used to "reset" the flapper. When that lever is pulled toward you it should latch with another part just away from you in the picture. Hard to tell from the angle of the picture but it looks like it might not be in the "RUN" position. This might not be the problem but need to start somewhere when trouble shooting a problem.
Here is a view of what it looks like from the opposite side: The Shut-down latch with the little hole at the top has a spring in it that holds it in a notch in the part the short lever goes through. On a very rare occasion something will cause it to jump out of the notch and kill the engine. Many engines have a cable or even a air or electric solenoid connected to that latch that is operated by a system of sensors to automatically shut-down engine when there is a problem. Even if the latch appears to be working I would try tripping it to see if the flapper does work. It should drop down with a "slapping" sound and then you can pull on that little lever to lift it back up and latch it again.
Thanks Kshansen for the suggestion' I checked that already and mine is on a cable to my dash board. I played with it to make sure it was opening and closing so it's not that but thanks.
I'm going to go out and try to rig up a container with a hose in the cab so it's higher then the motor to feed fuel to the supply line and see if I can get the air out of the lines to just get it going.
Well rigging up a temp tank will answer the question of possible plugged suction line in the fuel tank. Often the best way to figure problems out like this is to eliminate the simple things first. These Detroits are usually not hard to restart after running out of fuel. Just a quick description of how the standard fuel system should be connected: One line from fuel tank suction tube to primary fuel filter. Then one line from the primary fuel filter to the suction side of fuel pump mounted on front of governor housing. Next one line from fuel pump outlet to inlet of secondary fuel filter housing. Then two lines from outlet of secondary filter one going to right head and one going to left head. (NOTE some engines have only one on outlet of secondary filter that goes to a tee on one head and a jumper over to the other head.) The last on a V engine is a jumper between the heads with one end of it connected to a TEE fitting that also has a line going back to the fuel tank for the return. This TEE will be stamped with something like R70 as it is the restriction fitting that controls fuel pressure. It may be possible that this restriction fitting is plugged and causing the problem getting air out of system. Trying to think of things you could check easy. Any chance you have a small electric fuel pump? Or even a garden sprayer you could use to push fuel into the inlet of the secondary filter. That would be one way to be sure you had fuel getting to the injectors. Pressure is not real critical, for starting, as the injectors create the injection pressure and only need a supply of fuel to work with. You could have a weak fuel pump or bad seals that would make it hard to pick-up it's prime, but if it ran OK a couple days ago it should run again! Keep letting us know what you do and what the results are and we should be able to get it running again! I could come up with many things to suggest but best to try one or two things before getting to involved and confused!
Hey Kshansen I'm so happy right now' If you where here I would shake your hand a dozen times. It's running now. It was the Emergency Stop Engine lever' When you put up the picture I checked it on my truck and it was closed so I opened it and turned the key and it fired right up.I did not know about that one or what it was for' When I said I checked it I was talking about the T handle that you shut the truck off with that's what I thought you were talking about until I looked today with the picture you give me. I tried that knob on my dash for the Emergency stop and once you pull it that's it you have to go under and pull back on the lever so it latches again you can't do it from the cab. Never thought of that but you saved my a lot more work and it would of never started for me no matter what I would of done to it. Thanks again I reallyyyyyyyyyyyyy appreciate the picture and the help you have given me. This is something that I will always remember. Thanks, Jack
Good job Ken, I was not even thinking of the E stop as it had run out of fuel. May have got bumped while messing around trying to prime it also.
Some of the best news I have gotten lately!!!! The thing that made me suspect that was where you said it would crank and fire a couple times and die. What happens is there is enough "free air" in the cylinders and blower when shut off to cause it to fire once or twice then with the flapper down it creates a vacuum and seeing a diesel needs air to compress to make heat to ignite the fuel there is no compression due to no new air getting in the cylinder. The company I worked for for 45 years had the baby brother of your 6V-71, a 6V-53 that they managed to destroy an almost fresh rebuilt engine trying to get it to start with the flapper down. After spending hours trying to get it to run they called the outfit that had rebuilt it a few months back. When I happened to run into that outfits boss I asked him what they had found. The guy just shook his head then told me about the case of empty either cans that were laying on the machine when he got there! The problem with that machine was poor design of the controls. It was a rough terrain crane and when it was built they had used electrical solenoids to work the normal shut-down and also the emergency shut-down. Then they mounted the two buttons next to each other in the cab. Due to age and very poor house keeping the labels next to the push buttons were almost impossible to read. Add to that the way they moved machine from plant to plant so every time it was used a different operator was in the seat it was only a matter of time for something like that to happen.
Well thanks for sending me the "start a conversation" message as I probably would not have seen it otherwise as I know next to nothing about firetrucks. Guess I'm spending too much time trying to do something with a certain D6 up your way. Glad this one had a happy ending!
Happy Ending " Yes " Thank you both for helping me to figure this out. I would probable still be working on it. Thanks again Jack PS: What I don't get is why can't you reset it from in the cab like push the knob back in and the leaver will open again' Something like the way you shut the engine off' pull the knob or T handle and the motor stops push it back in and you can start it again. That would be a lot easer. But Hay why make stuff ease make us suffer or think about it. Lol
It's quite simple. The Emergency Stop is effectively Last Chance Saloon and does exactly what it says on the can. Detroits (well-worn ones anyway) have a habit of running away and burning their own lubricating oil as fuel. The only way to stop one if that happens is to cut off the air supply and that's what the E-Stop is for. I've seen them pull the seals in the blower inside-out if that happened while the engine was at full noise when the flap was dropped. In that case some quite deep mechanical inspection would be called for before even thinking about trying to start the engine again. The latch mechanism that controls the flap in the intake is a simple way of ensuring that once the E-Stop is pulled, it stays pulled until someone goes in there and physically resets the mechnism. Think yourself lucky that in your case the mechanism was activated accidently.
Yes this "Emergency Shut-Down" is just that to be only used in an emergency. Guess the designers felt that if you had used that as a way to kill the engine you should be checking things out before trying to restart the engine so "forcing" you to open hood and get in there to reset was a good thing. If it worked easy from inside the cab to reset you know many operators would think that was a "NORMAL" way to shut it down.
Many a true word. I recall we had a bunch of operators years ago running Terex/Euclid R50s equipped with Jimmy 16V-71s some of whom apparently did think the red handle was the approved way to shut the engine down. After the mechanics had rebuilt a few blowers where the seals had been turned inside-out as a result of the flaps being dropped by the operators in non-emergency situations the wrench turners "had words" with said operators and let them know the facts of life in single-syllable words .......