09 LMM low power, knocking and smoking under full load

Starter10

New member
Jul 27, 2016
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Hello all! I'm working on a 09 LMM ambulance. It came in with a under power complaint. The injectors have been done previous to this and with the same complaint. Today I test drove it up a fairly steep grade under full load, as soon as the fan came on full it seemed to begin misfiring then seemed to drop a cylinder or cylinders bellowing smoke and knocking horribly. I let off to about half throttle and after a second or two things went back to what sounded like normal so I kept on my way watching scan tool and waiting for the problem to occur again. Once I was out of traffic I went back to 100% throttle and once again it began to miss and bellow smoke along with knock only this time I let it go a bit longer at that time I noticed a ball of fire out the exhaust and let out of the throttle until the fire was out, pulled over and checked rig over. All seemed ok so I once again went on my way back to the shop. The rig ran ok (still under powered and a slight miss) I arrived back at the shop and removed the dog house and noticed #7 injector was leaking at the copper injector to head seal now I'm thinking this isn't the only problem being that the rig came in for this problem before injectors where replaced. I'll add all balance rates seem in check others then # 7 balance on power and injector was around 525. Fuel psi is reaching desired 26000 and only drops once the knocking starts also I checked the fuel suction side and never went past 8" under load and 2" at idle. I do notice when I take off the oil fill cap theres pressure vapor that seems to be consistent with the slight miss at idle. Any help would be great thanks in advance.
 

Burn Down

Hotrodder
Sep 14, 2008
7,092
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Boise Idaho
First off, welcome.

Who's injectors are they? Just because they were replaced doesn't mean quality ones were installed... Sounds like 7 is over fueling bad and pushed the injector out, hence the leak around the copper.

Flip the oil cap upside down and put it over the hole and see if the blowby will knock it off.
 

Starter10

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Jul 27, 2016
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I also am thinking 7 is over fueling but I do not see it in the balances but it would explain the losses of fp when the knocking/smoking occurs as for the injectors I'm not sure who the manufacture is. Outfit that rebuilds them out of Wisconsin. We've used them in several other rigs with no problems. I put my hand over the oil fill cap and it will build pressure. 300k miles on engine.


I will look at the balancer also although I don't see how it would be possible that it didn't fly apart after the beating I put on it today and yesterday evening.
 

Harbin_22

Active member
Dec 4, 2010
3,858
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Southern Indiana
When the front of my crank broke, I was getting 1&2 misfire codes but it didn't really knock or rattle. Just had a vibration. Wonder if you need to ice pick the harness
 

Starter10

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Jul 27, 2016
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misfire code for #7 some kind of lose of fuel code for 8 and the frp low psi code. That's about it for codes. The oil psi is low in my opinion also. Cold Start up is 40 and idling hot around 25 to 30. Hot under load is around 30 to 40psi. There is a slight knock at idle cold and goes away when I turn cylinders 7 and 8 off but the noise stays there when I turn the others off.
 

Starter10

New member
Jul 27, 2016
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Yes sir. #7 was leaking at copper gasket. I also noticed today the glow plug was pushed out a half inch from its core. After I installed the new injector and ran the rig it still had a miss so I decided to do a compression check.

I will post pics once the engine is out! There's nothing to see at this point.