Engine Trouble and Oil Analysis

[motormayhem]

Well since I have owned my CUCV I have always suspected something was a little funky with the motor. It has a tick on the drivers side of the intake when the air filter is off and when you have ear plugs in you can hear there is more clatter at the drivers side valve cover than the passenger side. I've known about the noise for about 10-15k or so and its hard to tell if it had changed. Over the last year or so occasionally when you start it it will not be running on all 8 cylinders. It will idle rough at 400rpm and be down on power. You can drive it and the drivers pipe will have a thin white smoke when you get on the gas. You have to rev it to about 3k where it will blow black out the pass and thick black/grey out the drivers pipe and then all cylinders are firing and it idles normally and might do it the next time you start it or be good for months.I also notice there are some very small bubbles in the coolant when she is up to temp and the rad cap is off that look like they could be coming from the heater core return. Oil looks black with no indication of coolant. Hard to tell if it uses coolant as I only have to add some maybe once a year and its not much so that would be attributed to evaporation from being hot in az. Based on these two things I decided to have the oil checked and got the attached results. Now when I sampled the oil I pulled the plug and drained just enough to fill the sample bottle. I know that can give unrealistically high results since its basically getting the crap in the bottom of the pan, but I wanted to see what other people have seen for their trucks and try to get an idea of what the not running on all cylinders issue could be. Its very sparatic and seems to run like it always has when its not doing that. I think maybe 1/2 the glow plugs are shot. If thats the case could it be a cylinder not lighting up? Should it have to be revved pretty high to start firing without a glow plug if its been sitting for only a few hours?

 

[firefox]

I would strongly advise getting all the glow plugs working.

 

[motormayhem]

Its usually only driven in the summer here when its about 100* out. Whats the issue (other than burning out the other plugs) with worn out glow plugs? It usually starts in 2-3 seconds.

 

[firefox]

This is just my opinion. If the glow plugs are working, then everything should fire up right away.
Otherwise you would get an imbalance of firings, which might not be that big a deal in the short
term, but over an extended period may cause the symptoms you are seeing.
I could be totaly wrong about this, but since it is an easy fix, I would try it.

 

[eme411]

it sounds much more like you may have a minor injector problem , pull the injectors and have them tested , they may have a poor spray pattern , need cleaning and or they need to be adjusted (pressure) , Bosch injectors are easy to work on and they will make noise if they are not adjusted properly, find a shop that does this type of work and has the shims and tester required, local guys that work on VW or Mercedes can be of help , being a Bosch injector the Bar pressure rating should be on the injector, poor injectors will cause noise , white smoke, rough running,