Slightly Smokey 13BT (1 Viewer)

[MyCruiserisaHogBeast]

Hey Everyone,

I'm getting a feel for the BJ74 I acquired over the summer. It runs great, has plenty of power (for a 120hp motor) and gets fuel economy in the low 20s on 33" tires, driven daily. Overall I'm really happy with it. The one thing I don't dig is the smokiness. It's not a lot of smoke, I'm sure it would be acceptable to a lot of Cruiser heads, but I am a closet tree hugger and would like it gone. I'm coming from a Cummins powered FJ62 that I had dialed to run on B99 and WVO and whatever else I threw at it with nearly no smoke. I also owned a 1HZ powered rig before this which was an entirely different animal.

Anyway, I've read all of the smoke posts and I wanted to spend some time with this motor before I started messing with it. It's pretty typical blackish diesel smoke, noticeable haze when cold, cleans up when it's warm but always leaves a haze when you're on the accelerator. If it burns oil, it's not much. Turbo seems fine. In my Cummins rig, I dialed the fuel, increased the boost and set the timing and pretty much got rid of everything. On that vehicle I ran an intercooler and it comfortably handled 25psi of boost. On this, I don't want to take it away from factory so I won't get to those sorts of numbers. I just acquired a boost and pyro gauge that I'll be plugging in to see where everything is at. There is a little leaking going on at the fuel injectors. Can't really tell what's going on there, it was a lot when I first started driving it, but it's toned down to a point where I debate whether it's worth messing with until I am ready to replace the fuel lines. Factory fuel lines look good, but I play on replacing them at some point.

So for the questions:
Is there a magic bullet for smoke on this vehicle?

I've read some info about shimming the waste gate to get a little extra out of the factory turbo. Can anyone here confirm there experiences with this? Getting a little more boost as fast as possible was the key to getting rid of the smoke out of the Cummins truck.

I believe the fuel pump is unmolested. I am not terribly familiar with it. Anyone have any advice on tweaking it? Should I leave it alone? I'm looking for fuel economy and enough power to do 70 on the freeway (which is does just fine), other than that I'm not trying to make it haul ass.

Thanks for any replies!

 

[roscoFJ73]

Black smoke is most likely tired injectors. Leaking around the injectors usually means it needs new washers. I would get those things checked out before you start fiddling with waste gates etc.

 

[brownbear]

I hear you on the smoke. I don't like dirty diesels and it gives us a bad rep.

As rosco says, have the injectors cleaned and set to ensure they are opening at the correct pressures.

I would also perform a compression test at the same time to ensure what we have going on isn't just a low cylinder.

As far as the turbo goes, a couple things. It may make PSI, but check it for play and see what the bearings are like. I would also take off the intake pipe and look inside it for oil.

As far as cranking up the pressure it's done with the pressure line to the waste gate. You can buy a dial-able valve you put in the line to set the pressure. I see no reason you cannot go to 13-14 psi with no intercooler. (did you say you had one on this?)

I run 13-14 on my 3B. But it comes at higher RPM. I actually think it's time to replace my turbo with something that is lower spooling.

 

[MyCruiserisaHogBeast]

I hear you on the smoke. I don't like dirty diesels and it gives us a bad rep.

As rosco says, have the injectors cleaned and set to ensure they are opening at the correct pressures.

I would also perform a compression test at the same time to ensure what we have going on isn't just a low cylinder.

As far as the turbo goes, a couple things. It may make PSI, but check it for play and see what the bearings are like. I would also take off the intake pipe and look inside it for oil.

As far as cranking up the pressure it's done with the pressure line to the waste gate. You can buy a dial-able valve you put in the line to set the pressure. I see no reason you cannot go to 13-14 psi with no intercooler. (did you say you had one on this?)

I run 13-14 on my 3B. But it comes at higher RPM. I actually think it's time to replace my turbo with something that is lower spooling.

First thing I'm going to do is run some SeaFoam through it before I start working on it, and I'll see how it does. Been thinking about doing a compression test, but with no flat spots and the history I know of on the truck, I would be shocked to see anything so I haven't really worried about that side of things. Like I said in the post before, on a scale of 1-10 the smoke is like, maybe a 3. Turbo is good, checked for oil and all that.

No intercooler and I don't plan on adding one, I want to start at 10 psi or so. From what I gather these things run at really low boost.

 

[duncanrm]

I've seen Liqui Moly Diesel Purge Plus clean up smoke a bit.. it would be worth grabbing a bottle and a new fuel filter - fill the new filter with the Purge Plus and run it through. I do it every time I change my fuel filter.

 

[speycaster]

All B model landcruisers are old technology, that is why most of us have them. You are never going to get them to run as clean as even a B model Cummins. If you are worried about the environment get something a lot newer. My 85 BT13 smokes on start up and a bit of black before the turbo catches up to the fuel. It is what it is and I do not worry about it.

 

[MyCruiserisaHogBeast]

All B model landcruisers are old technology, that is why most of us have them. You are never going to get them to run as clean as even a B model Cummins. If you are worried about the environment get something a lot newer. My 85 BT13 smokes on start up and a bit of black before the turbo catches up to the fuel. It is what it is and I do not worry about it.

We should all be concerned about this stuff to an extent. Even if you're a tin foil hat climate denial specialist, rolling coal just makes all of us truck guys look stupid from an optics perspective. Not saying you are, but its something I think we should be aware of.

 

[speycaster]

I am just saying that old diesels will never run as clean as a newer one. It does not matter how much money that you throw at them, they will run the way the technology at the time designed them to run. You can probably get a cat on the exhaust and clean them up, but I am not going to go to the trouble to do that. These old vehicles are a very small percentage of vehicles on the road, so are not that much of a problem air pollution wise. You live in California and things might be different their, but I think human excrement on the streets of San Fransico is a bigger problem than some old diesels leaving a little haze in the air.

 

[roscoFJ73]

I believe the fuel pump is unmolested

It would still have the wire ties on the various control screws.

 

[MyCruiserisaHogBeast]

Update for anyone who reads this: did a full Seafoam hot soak process with a new fuel filter as per Seafoam’s instructions and it all but completely eliminated smoke. Runs great and really smoother out the idle.

If you have a smoky rig I highly recommend you try this before looking at injectors, ect.