no start

[Kurt Henzler]

sorry for the long post , but i have to tell you all what happened to me this past couple days. drove to deer camp , 15 miles from any cell phone service and 2 miles from any real road and parked truck. got up Monday morning to go hunting and truck started right up (temp was 8 degrees) ran for about 1 minute and stopped. starter again , ran for 10 seconds and stopped, again for 5 seconds and stopped. the water sensor never came on, but thought maybe that was it. drained fuel filter container and replaced fuel filter. bumped starter and could here pump running for about10-15 seconds. did this about 5 times to fill container. no start. opened fuel filter lid to find no fuel at all. bumped starter with lid off and no fuel comes into canister at all. let truck sit entire day, night, and following day. temp went to 38. tried again at 4pm with no luck. filled canister manually with fuel and truck ran for 5 seconds and stopped. did this several times.



gave up and called dodge. they found a flatbed service that would come and deliver truck to nearest dealer. after 2-3 hours he came and tried truck one more time.



starter and never quit. i drove home 150 miles with zero problems.



was the fuel line frozen at the tank. i never use a fuel treatment of any kind.



should i take it to a dealer? this can happen to anybody, i completely ruins everything for yourself and all others that you are with.

 

[nickleinonen]

8°f is cold. if the fuel gel'd up on you, the lines are not going to flow at all... there is [i think?] a fuel heater in the fuel filter mounting pad/housing which could have thawed the fuel in there to allow it to flow & run for that short bit of time... .

 

[robobx]

I don't have an answer, but last winter I lived in butler and it got pretty cold, I wasn't able to plug the truck in all the time and I never had a problem. I did notice at times it was much harder to start the wife's Jetta TDI on the really cold days. I switched away from Quik Fill fuel and the problem disappeared.

Where you get your fuel?



PS. where around the 'Burgh are you?

 

[Kurt Henzler]

robolox

i live in shaler only always buy citgo diesel on rt 8. they were closed on sunday and had to go up the street to get BP for the only the 2nd or 3rd time ever. truck took about 20 gallons to fill. drive 150 miles. got great mileage, shut of , and could not re start the next morning. i don not know what to do.



truck is running fine today. shut off and opened yellow lever on fuel canister and only about 1/2 once of fuel drained.



is my pump bad, how do i check it. or is this normal

 

[ImagesThatSing]

Kurt, Think about changing your fuel filter. It may be you got a bad load of fuel. I have seen/heard/read of similar symptoms being solved by this replacement.

 

[robobx]

How many miles you have on the truck?

I'd probably change the fuel filter too. I think the Pittsburgh region has alot cleaner fuel than we do down here. I was able to go much farther before needing to chang out FFs, down here it's every 10,000 miles max.

 

[Jumbo Jet]

1st and only fuel filter problem I ever had was filling up at a BP outside Nashville, TN. Truck stops only for me from now on!

 

[Kurt Henzler]

jumbo jet



how did you know that is was a fuel problem and not a truck problem

 

[Prairie Dog]

I've had fuel gel in other diesels at warmer temps than that, especially if there wasn't a whole lot in the tank.

 

[Kurt Henzler]

i had about 25 gallons in tank when truck stopped. (in only ran for about one min after start up) the filter looked ok had about 3000 miles on it, changed it anyways. you could cycle the lift pump 10 times and open the lid and there would not be any fuel in container. i hand primed several times with no luck. it started the next night and i do not know why.



i don't want this to happen again. if i take it to the dealer while it is working, they are not going to find any problems.



unless the lift pump is bad or weak and our trucks do need them to operate for them to run. how can i test it.



i would think that if the fuel line froze , there would have been gel in the container and you would read everyday on this board of someone that could not start their truck.

 

[rbattelle]

This is an interesting problem. If the fuel canister was empty, then obviously something between the tank and the canister was garfed up. I wouldn't think a gelling problem would occur at that temp, with that much fuel in the tank. If it were me, I'd carry around a bottle of "Diesel 911" by Power Service, or equivalent, and try that if it happens again.

 

[DCTECH]

I would have your dealer to a volume test on your lift pump. I had one at our dealership start and stall whenever it gets cold out. Fuel volume was way below spec and have ordered new pump but are on backorder. Makes one wonder if we have a supplier/part problem. Can't even get one from Cummins.

 

[ScottBrown]

Check the fuel line at the tank and at the pump. is fuel dribbling out, or is it flowing out?

I worked on a similar problem and found the tank had bad fuel the crud that came out looked like a tree leaf.

 

[Kurt Henzler]

to check fuel lines, do i have to drop the tank?

 

[DCaswell]

You likely get only summer type fuel down there & it will start to cloud at 32 f. I would always carry a bottle of fuel treatment & add some if I headed north or if it got cold. Up here I use an additive called Polar Power everytime I fuel up. 0 f here today but we will see -30 before winter is over

 

[ScottBrown]

An easy way to see if fuel is flowing is to open the water seperator valve and turn the ignition on. but dont start the engine.

you should see fuel comming out at a pretty good rate.



1. With the engine not running. Place a drain pan under the Fuel Filter/Water Separator drain hose.



2. Open the Fuel Filter/Water Separator drain valve to its fully open position (90 degree rotation).



3. Turn the ignition switch to the RUN position (do not start the engine), this will run the fuel lift pump for 2 seconds. As the fuel lift pump runs, it will purge fluid out of the Fuel Filter/Water Separator drain hose into the drain pan.



4. Turn the Ignition switch to the OFF position.



5. Cycle the Fuel Filter/Water Separator drain valve several times from open to closed. At this point the Fuel Filter/Water Separator drain valve should continue to function properly. If this Fuel Filter/Water Separator drain valve does not drain properly, repeat steps 1 through 5 again.



NOTE: THE NORMAL FLUID FLOW FROM THE FUEL FILTER/WATER SEPARATOR DRAIN HOSE IS A STREAM THAT IS BETWEEN 1. 6 MM AND 3. 2. MM (1/16 AND 1/8 IN. ) DIAMETER.

 

[Driver72]

I've been there. Your fuel gelled. After running my fourth CTD since 1990 it was bound to happen. 40 degrees on a "balmy" January day filled the truck with the good ole #2 fuel. By the next week we had below zero temps; typical for Montana. Truck ran long enough to get me on the highway then quit. Waited a little while and it started right up and repeated the problem. I knew better but tried to save a nickle on fuel, should have bought the winter blend on the next pump over.



Had to get some #1 in the tank; kind of tough when it's already full of this melted butter looking stuff. Every try siphoning 90 weight gear lube. After a mess I finally got 10 gallons of #2 out and 9 gallons of #1 in and a 1/2 gallon of anti gel additive, filled the filter with #1 and got her started. Generator and portable heaters under truck until she warmed up enough to stay running and allow the fuel to "kind of" mix together. Not one of my better days. Lost loads and thus revenue during my usual slow month.



I've learned from this and never have repeated the experience. Buy winter blend December through February, run John Deere or Stanadyne fuel additives and complete fuel filter change if oil change is due during these months. Four trucks and over 750,000 miles and only this one bad gelling problem. Hope this helps.

 

[PaulG]

well the last two mornings i got a similer thing happen. it's only been in the 20's the last couple of days but truck would kick over for about a second and then it wouldn't for like 2 min worth of cranking then barly start. I even had it plugged in thinking the morning b-4 same problem so i plugged it in and added ani-gel to my full tank of gas but never got to drive on it to mix it in and get it thru the lines. lets hope tomorrow morning it will just start up with no problems cause i know it was warm this morning cause the "please wait" light only can on for 1 sec before going out. not sure but i'll bet the gas was bad that i got. work is like 12 miles each way so that should be good enough to mix it in =)

 

[CCOLLAR]

You can also add kerosene to the tank to break up gelled fuel. Whatever you add, it takes a good amount of time before it migrates through the lines. We were hit by a cold spell a while back, before the #1 and #1/#2 blends were widley available, and there were a ton of diesels sitting on the side of the road.



I suppose you could pull off the lift pump feed line and pour some antigel down it to break up the wax buildup between the tank and the pump. Or use a portable propane heater and try to warm the feed lines that way.



The fuel canister has a heating element in it -- I doubt you would see any gelled fuel in it after you spent some time trying to start the engine. Rather, you would use up the fuel in the canister and then have an empty canister.



One last thought: there is a screen filter in the fuel tank that might be gunked up. If you got bad fuel, you might have an algae buildup, thought this is probably not likely.



Craig

 

[dseabaugh]

Quite a few years ago I had the same problem and found that there were frozen water crystals in the fuel. Very very small suspended in the fuel. They would stop up the filter . No water setltled out so apparently there was an additive to keep them suspended ( alcohol ???). Change the filter right after it quits and look at it to see if it is coated in what looks like slush or fuel soaked snow. . Just a further note, alcohol is a solvent rather than a lubricant so those of you who use alcohol at a high enough concentration to prevent freezing need to know you a probably damaging your system.