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MEP 531a taught me a lesson

FarmingSmallKubota

Well-known member
Steel Soldiers Supporter
454
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93
Location
Wapakoneta, Ohio
So i have been buying and selling these 531a units for a while now and rather enjoy working on them. Probably 20 units in and many more to go in the waiting area. I started on this unit 2 weeks ago. it came in with no oil plugs or dip sticks, fuel lines rotted, wire loom toast, fuel tank bushings dry rotted, and the low oil sensor busted. Piston rings stuck in the block, but with Kroil and a little nudge with a socket wrench it freed right up. Not the first time i have done this. a little more work but standard protocal is to replace and fix parts and of course get all of that done and go to start it and the injector nozzle is clogged. It definitely had been apart seeing that one of the alignment pins was replaced with a piece of wire but got that cleand up. Engine starts and smokes as expected with all of that kroil on top of the piston. clears up and then i put a 1500 watt load on and this thing sounds like the ring broke, knocking like crazy and i could have sworn that the picton was going to go. It shuts off and i let it cool down. starts back up but knocking and i put my head down sad that i assumed the rings broke. I let it sit a day and fired it up again this time it ran but would not come up to full engine speed, after words i hear sizzling from the exhaust so i assumed i had oil getting past the rings and it was done for. That was Sunday I moved onto another unit which ended up with a bad voltage regulator but good motor and just was contemplating taking the electrical box from the this one and putting on the other since it had a good motor. I stewed on it all week and come
Friday i figured i would try to see how much oil was blowing out and take the exhaust cover off. Those ring sections were caked with oil and soot/Sludge so i fire it up and 1 minute later the smoke clears and this thing runs like new. No oil bypassing, no smoke just normal. I load it up to 1500 watts and for 2 hours runs like a top. I have never been fooled like that by a clogged exhaust. I am glad i didnt give up on it, but still baffled by how bad of a sound that thing made and how good it runs now. I cleaned the exhaust parts and put them back on and load tested it again just to be sure. its in perfect working order.
 
Last edited:

2Pbfeet

Well-known member
369
651
93
Location
Mt. Hamilton, CA
Congratulations on persevering and getting it running beautifully!

I've only seen it on bigger units that were under loaded for long periods of time. I've noticed that the carbon seems to come out more easily if the loading during "burn out" is a bit variable until the exhaust system is mostly clean. The ones that I've seen threw burning chunks of carbon and got the mufflers glowing. Scary to watch, but a real lesson in how "lean" engines run under load. I think that your start / stop / start /load /run seems right on target for shaking the carbon out.

I've got a civilian version of it and I really like it. It actually taught me a fair bit more about diesels because it is such a straightforward engine.

All the best,

2Pbfeet
 
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