Help! New diesel tractor issue
 

I just bought an Iternational 674 diesel. they guy I bought it from had it overhauled about 200 hours ago, and he just changed the motor oil and hydraulic fluid.

I hadn't even had it an hour yet, was driving it back from the neighbors' where I went to get fuel. It was about a mile away. I was driving it at about 2500 rpms, when I noticed the oil guage drop down to almost zero...since it's a new tractor to me, wasn't sure if the guage was working properly or not. Looked behind me and under me, no oil coming out from anywhere. then suddenly, a big puff of smoke from the front of the engine, and an awful squeeling noise form the engine. I jerked it off the road and shut it down immediately.

I checked the oil again, and there was plenty. In fact, if anything, both they oil and the hydraulic fluid are over full. All belts intact. Nothing leaking or dripping from the tractor anywhere!

A neighbor came and pulled me home with his tractor.
After I got home, I checked it all over again, and crossing my fingers tried to start it again. It started right up, and sounded fine when it ran. I didn't run it a long time, though, I mainly wanted to make sure the engine hadn't seized. Thank goodness!!!

What could have caused this? Any ideas? Besides draining out the excess oil, what should i do? how serious was this?? I'm kind of scared to run it now for fear of damaging the motor.

I am not a mechanic, nor do I play one on TV.

Any chance this was a sludge problem?

Is the correct oil in the block?

One web forum to try this question would be redpower.com. Just post this in the forum section.

As dumb as it sounds, another forum that would be good would be allischalmers.com. Just make sure you put the words "Off Color" in the title. Lots of guys run both orange and red tractors.

How would I know if it was sludge?

I know the guy put Rotella 15w40 in it, he showed me the jug. I'm reading the manual right now, and trying to figure out the right kind of oil for this tractor. I believe it says just plain SAE 30. Would that sound right? Could the oil he put in it have messed it up?


I will check over at the other forums, thanks.

This tractor has a saddle tank and often it will not feed fuel from one side to the other of the saddle. Fill the tank with fuel and then restart the tractor and see if all is OK. Watch the oil pressure and only idle the engine until you are satisfied it is running OK and you have oil pressure. Also look behind your right lower leg when sitting in the seat. You have not accidently hit the remote lever for the hydraulics with your foot have you? Push the level all the way down and bring it half way back up. This level will cause a squeel if in the wrong position. These are great tractors! Hope your problems clear with the above efforts.
PS.....the fuel level must be high enough in the tank for the left side to cross over to the right side over the hump in the center of the tank. The fuel filter could have clogged also. Was the fuel at the neighbors real clean? I think you have starved the engine for fuel somehow. I am rather familiar with these tractors. As for damage, if there was any major problem the damage has already been done IMO. The former owner ran the engine for 200 hours, normally the engine would have failed early if there was a problem with the overhaul. PS#2.....You could cut open the oil filter and drain the crankcase into a clean bucket and see if there is any metal fragments there or trapped in the filter paper before restarting the engine. Hopefully it is just a fuel problem.

The oil is not the problem. If it lost oil pressure it will be a mechanical problem. Usually the oil pump if it were overhauled it will be usually a key in the drive for the oil pump left out. It will work fine as long as it is coled but when it gets hot it may slip and loose oil pressure. That is where I would look first. To do this you need to drop the oil pan and look at the oil pump.

The only thing I could think of was that I have seen guys fail to clean the oil passages during rebuilds. This, as I understand it, can lead to oil pressure problems and oiling probs.

I wondered if the right oil was in the case. It has been known that sometimes a slick seller will load up the case with super heavy oil to quiet down a motor, if I am not mistaken.

Just trying to eliminate potential probs.

Like I said before, I am not a mechanic, and it shows to my ignorance in my posts, LOL.

What the other OP's said makes alot of sense.

Thank you for your suggestions. Agmantoo, would a fuel supply prob. cause the front end to put out smoke and squeal like that? Also, that wouldn't seem to cause the oil pressure guage to suddenly go down to nothing, would it? I know diesels should never be run out of fuel, and this one was pretty low looking (the neighbor wasn't home, so I had to return without fresh fuel) but there was still some fuel in it. I'm going to go buy some today.

Old Vet, how big of a job is it to look at the oil pump? Assuming I could get the oil pan off and cleaned out, what exactly would I look for? I assume running the tractor in this state is not good for it unless I only run it for a few minutes at a time.

I'm going to call an IH dealer and ask their advice as well. I did register over at Red power, but for some reason I can't post there.

We use 15w 40 in all our diesels. 30 weight is for gas engines so far as I know. Sounds like an oil pump problem to me, maybe the oil cooler is plugging up stalling the oil pump? Just a guess, I'd call the mechanic in. 674 is one nice IH so I hope it works out for you!

Try posting the same question at allischalmers.com. No registration or waiting to post. Like I said before, lots of guys there run red tractors too. Some pretty smart folks over there, and to my knowledge, a bigger site than redpower.

I would entitle the thread: Off Color: IH 674 problems

Clove

I called the local IH guys and talked to a mechanic. he had me pull some crankcase oil and look for anti freeze - none that I could see. I started it, and it ran just fine - no smoke, no bad noises, all belts and fans running, and the oil pressure guage went up to normal... so I guess that eliminates a fuel problem. Let her idle for a good 5 minutes, and no problems at all.

Called the mechanic back, and he said he really didn't know. I asked about a key missing in the oil pump, and he said he'd be real surprised if one sheared on that engine, but he also said if that were the case, it wouldn't have any oil pressure.

He advised me to put straight SAE 30 in, saying that's what those engines were designed to run on, and he said it would settle out any anti freeze better as well. He said to just watch it really carefully when it gets hot to see if it's gonna do it again.

thanks for the AC tip, Clove, i will go over there as soon as I have more time.

You have not eliminated a possible fuel problem. A nearly clogged fuel filter will idle all day long but will cause the engine to falter when being operated at a higher speed. I have seen this problem also originate from trash in the bottom of the saddle tanks. I suggest you ride to the neighbor with the fuel source and back at a higher RPM and see what happens.

Im lost,how does fuel affect the oil pressure?

If the engine stumbles you wil loose pressure. Diesels are low RPM engines at the best of times so dropping speed realy kills things like oil P and generator amps/volts. Its the smoke that has me wondering. Unless it's just the valve cover vent dusting off some blowby from a misfire.... which could be a fuel prob.

I spoke to another IH mechanic today and he seemed more concerned about perhaps a cam coming out. I figured out that was a part inside the oil pump or the engine itself. He said to check the oil real good for metal shavings or filings, and I have, so far, and found none that I could see. I even saved some of the first oil in a jar, waiting to see if it settles out anything suspicious, but so far, just looks like plain old oil to me.
I bought some SAE 30 oil and a new filter, and i will change that out just to be sure.

I didn't mention it in my first post, but I never did get to fuel up at the neighbors. He was leaving, and i wound up turning around and coming back without filling anything up. I was having trouble getting the tractor into high, so I was driving it in 4 low, at about 2500 rpm's. Since then I have learned the trick to getting it into high range.

Today I got 5 gallons of off road diesel at a station and put that in. Seems like the tank(s) are a little over half full now.

If i'm eliminating a fuel problem, what should I do next? Change the fuel filter? Wait and see if the newer fuel makes a difference? The fuel in it could well have been sitting in it a while.

My plan at this point is to drop all the old crankcase oil, fresh filter, and also drain off hydraulic fluid until it's at the recc. level, and then.....hope nothing like that ever happens again? I really like this tractor, and I'd like to have a long and prosperous relationship with it!

I have two IH tractors that are almost the same as yours. One is used very frequently and I have owned it for many years. As I stated, I am familiar with the tractor. I personally overhauled one of them. I mentioned earlier about opening the oil filter and looking for metal. That recommendation still stands. I mentioned verifying that the remote hydraulic lever was in the correct position, you never responded to that. I told you that the fuel level needs to be high enough for the fuel to spill over from the left half of the saddle tank to the right side. Five gallons may not be enough. I asked you to replicate the trip to see how the tractor ran with the higher RPM. I do not recall a reply. I am like a cow chain, I have been through most of the carp. You are grasping for straws with the crankcasae oil and hydraulic oil while I am trying to get you back to running. Is there anyone that is mechanically inclined in the family that I can communicate with?

I think you're barking up the wrong tree with the fuel thing. She said she was running at 2500 rpm when it happened. No mention of stumbling or cutting out.
And a misplaced hyd lever isn't going to drop your engine oil to almost 0 unless it dogs your motor down to almost 0 rpms.

The lever will make the squeal! Do you not think you can run out of fuel when running 2500 RPM and lose the oil pressure? These tractors had a steel saddle tank and moisture is prone to accumulate in the bottom where on each side. There is a crossover pipe and and outlet fitting located there. Both have a tendency to clog and starve the engine for fuel. When the engien is deprived for fuel at 2500 RPM lots of things happen. In the effort to get off the road and to try to control the machine it is difficult to recall in the brief time what all occurred, particularly on a tractor that a person is unfamiliar with. I have put more than 5000 hours on a machine of this type and have personally witnessed a lot of the things that can and will go wrong. Two of the neighbors also have these machines, who do you think they call upon when things go wrong?

I'm just curious Agman do any of your IH diesels call for SAE 30? I doubt it would hurt it but I would have thought it was speced out on 15w 40 in the owners manual. We're pretty much always been Ford here but we had a B275 and a few odd brands (if Massey is odd! :) )

( HSH other half )
I was a truck mech , worked on Cummins Rolls Detroit and most everything else .

IT dont matter what oil is used , the problem is the loss of oil pressure , and the squeal , oil pressure loss is a TOTAL disaster for a diesel ,.
drop the oil pan and check the bearings big ends AND mains , their could easily be a main bearing spun , (welded to the crank and turning in the block ) it will run like this and not make any unusual noises untill it starts to WORK , THEN YOU GET A ROD THRU THE SIDE , dismantle and check, fit a new oil pump while you are in there , it will be a hell of a lot cheaper to check than getting a new cylinder block without a hole in it .
also check for ground up metal in the oil pan when its taken off , if there is any there keep looking untill you find the source .

Ross
I have always used Chevron Delo 400 30 weight, mainly because I buy oil in 55 gallon barrels and that is what the old Cats used in the engine and the powershifts. Several years ago Chevron changed the formulation and that is what i continue to use in anything that is diesel. Newer engines that spec multi-viscosity get the Delo after they have 100,000 miles or a couple thousand hours. Remember, I am in zone 7 and it is hot here and a worked machine will run on the high side temp wise. I have to watch oil temps and I want something that will have some body to it. It doesn't get cold enough to have cranking problems here with the 30 wt. I let machines warm up before putting the throttle to them in Winter.

I have reread the original post and I am unclear in exactly what you observed
Was the first thing you noticed that the oil pressure was 0 or low?
At that instant was the engine running or was the engine cutting out or dead?
The squeal and the smoke, did they happen at the same time or did you hear the squeal and then see the smoke?
You stated you went to the side of the road and shut down. Was the engine running and you shut it down or did you just turn the fuel and the switch off and the engine was already stopped? This is where I am the most confused. Thanks

As a precaution and due to the difficulty of getting the cast iron pan off the tractor take the oil filter to a dealer and have his shop to open the filter and inspect it for metal. If you have metal shavings do not restart the tractor. If the filter is metal free the problem is elsewhere.

Funny someone else has not suggested this. Call your dealer, ask them if they have the oil anylsis kit. You will get a bottle in this kit to put the oil from the motor in. Take it back to the dealer. They send it off and then you get a report back. In this report it will tell of antifreeze in the oil metal particles smaller then you can see. Also it can tell you how the engine is running by a chemicals found in the oil itself. Many farmers have switched to doing this on newer tractors as preventive maintanance.
Some of the things that will pull a engine down and cause it to squeal and smoke are, bad alternator bearings, or water pump bearing seizeing then releaseing.
Bob

After thinking about this a minute longer and rereading the first post.
Due to the age of this tractor I would geuss it has a electric oil pressure gauge. If there was a issue with the alternator failing it may cause the gauge to zero due to the loose of power to it. Also if the alternator went and overcharged ti would pull the engine down and slip the belts. Yes delco alts do fail and somke real bad when they do sometimes. I would check to see if its charging now or just along for a ride.
Bob

Agh, just lost a post :mad:
Okay, First, to answer Agmantoo-
I was driving steadily down the road at @2400 rpm's. The engine did not surge or do anything abnormal. i just looked at the guages, and noticed the oil guage was dropping fast and steady. (the temp was normal) Quickly looked behind and under, no evidence of losing any oil. Looked back up, still driving, wondering if the guage was faulty, it went to 0 and in the next instant, the squeal and the smoke. They all hapened pretty much simultaneously, I dont think I could say which came first. I jerked the steering wheel to the right and immediatley cut the engine (which was still running) by using the shut off lever, not the key. I didnt even get it all the way off the road. the whole incident happened in less than 10 seconds I'd guess. I did not hit the lever with my leg, and the squeal came from in front, not from under the seat. the engine was not surging or sputtering in any way.

So far, in the first oil i have drained off, I have not found any metal that i can see. The guys I talked to said i would be able to see the pieces if they were there, are there other opinions on this?

Madsaw, do you know how much the test costs? This might be a good option, and put my mind at rest one way or the other. i was going to change the oil and filter anyway, I can try to cut the old filter open with a tin snips and see what i can see.

it is not an electrical sensor, it is a mechanical oil guage, there is a tube coming off the oil filter, not a wire. I sure hope it's a fuel problem or something other than a shot bearing or something like that.

If it was something serious like that, would I still be able to get oil pressure upon startup and idle, like i am?

I am thinking the tests are about 25-30 .
I would assume someone changed it over to a mechanical then. Trace the tube up to the gauge making sure there is no kinks or bad spots in it.
I had a water pump bearing lock up in a 1030 case one day. I swore the engine blew up. But, when you shut them down they tend to roll back the opposite way just at the very end and this is sometime enough to jar a stuck bearing back loose.
Is this the 674 from Broadhead with the loader. If so that was a good price and a nice looking tractor. Just curious though why was it rebuilt in the first place.
Bob

Yup, that's the one. I do like the tractor, and except for this pesky 'blowing up' issue, I'd be real happy. I got the work order on the rebuild. Owner told me they had used the wrong antifreeze, work order says engine overheating. That cost him over $6,000. The way I looked at it, unless the tractor was a lemon, which should have been determined long ago, a lot of parts in the engine and system are practically new. They had the block checked for cracks, etc. But there is no way I can afford a job like that right now after just buying the tractor. I am thinking of calling the previous owner and ask him if he has anything to say about it.

The mechanical guage shouldnt be a re-build, it is indicated as such in the owners' manual. But I'll check it for kinks anyway.

The test sounds like a good idea. I'll call Carter-Gruenwald and see if they carry them, or do you know of a better place to find that?

I just looked again at the jar I caught the oil in. There is some sediment in there, that I can only describe as very very fine, and somewhat shiny. Uh-oh. I can't really tell by looking at it if it's metal, or dirt or what. I want to find a magnet and try that on it.

Open the oil filter! Do not use a hacksaw to cut it open. Either use a large pipe cutter or rip it open with pliers and tin snipes so as not to introduce any metal. It could have done as Hip_Shot_Hanna's other half stated. AT 2500 RPM you were at or near full throttle. You do not at this time want to take a risk. If you damage the block the repair will equal the value of the tractor.

I have seen a few weird things over the yrs with tractors. Bought a 930 case that a oldtimer rebuilt. Ran the tar out of it for 6 yrs. Then one day lost oil pressure when grinding feed. Waited till summer to drop the pan. I could not beleive that teh old guy forgot to torque 2 main bearings. One cap finally got loose enough to allow the top bearing to float around and hang up in the cap. Had a extra set of bearings here so I replaced that one. The other cap was loose but it did not float around. I just replaced it and torqued every buddy down. I ran it till last yr it blew a head gasket. So it parked for now. That was another 5 yrs after I replaced the 2 bearing sets.
I have never had the chance to hear a engine spin a bearing. The squeal you heard was it a deep sound or like a dry wheel bearing? Also what did the smoke smell like.
Later
Bob

Well, I had the neighbor come over and he looked at it a bit and we talked. He is the one who hauled it for me, he has the fuel, he is generally very knowledgeable about machinery. He didn't think it was a fuel issue.

He took a look at the oil I saved, and didnt think there was anything in it. He thought maybe the issue was too much crankcase oil, maybe there is a cutoff switch in the engine or something, and that is what caused the engine to fail, too much oil. I showed him how much was in it (it was really over full, by about two inches at least on the dipstick) He is going by some other neighbors who run and work on Internationals and ask them what they think as well.

I plan to drain the oil and run it through a paint filter to look for junk. Then I'll cut open the oil filter and look in there. Probably this Friday.

Bob, I've never heard a bearing go out, either, thankfully (well, until now?). A long time ago, a water pump went on a car I had, and it kind of sounded like that. It smelled kind of bad, like maybe burnt oil but I'm sorry...I couldn't say for absolutely sure, except that I know it wasnt burnt anti-freeze, or anything like that. It happened real fast, was over real fast, and I haven't tried to repeat it since then for fear of making a bad situation worse.

I called a diesel mechanic I know and read him your inputs. He confirmed the need to open the filter. He is of the opinion that a bearing has spun.
There is no cutoff switch for oil level.

The jar of oil you have there does it smell like diesel fuel? You would think the guy spent that kind of money on a rebuild he would not have over filled it that much. If it has diesel in the oil it would thin it out enough to cause the loose of pressure and the chance of spinning the bearing. Your discription of smoke from teh front of the engine does not sound nothing like a main bearing failing. Any snoke from that would have come out the breather pipe.
Just curiuos what way broadhead do you live.
Bob

This tractor is gravity fed to the injector pump. There is no diaphragm from a fuel pump to rupture.

Agman,
There is seals in the Ip to that can fail. Not very likely but ir does happen. There was a super MD here this spring that I found the pump on the IP was bad and dumping fuel into the crankcase.
Welsh,
If your near monroe give studers a call and see if they can get teh oil checked for you. That will tell alot and save alot of geussing. If you was close to me I could if I had the time take a look at it too.
Later
Bob

HSH other half again .
IF it has spun a bearing all is not lost ,
i do not know which engine you have but i worked on a I H ,straight 6 ,wet liner type ,in a combine harvester that had a broken main bearing bolt causing the shell to spin , I "repaired" it , polishing the crankshaft back up with fine (2000) wet and dry paper , and shimed up the main bearing with brass shim stock between the shell and the block / mainbearing cap ,(lots of messing here with plastguage and micrometer to get the corect bearing "nip" ) , as far as i know it's still running , i do know it ran 10 years / harvests without problems .
a very sucesfull " bodge " but nessecity is the mother of invention . (well that and a empty pocket book )

We (my neighbors and I) are hoping at this point that it may have been due to too much oil in it, or a stuck thermostat, etc. We are going to change out the oil and take it over to some guys who have a filter (they are the ones who work on IH's) and look it over good. They will take a good look at the filter as well. Then the plan is to re-fill it with fresh oil and filter, possibly also do the transmission fluid, and then drive it down the road again to test it out. Keeping my fingers crossed.

Bob, thank you for the offer, but I am in Dane county, in Christiana twp., so a little too far for that. Nice of you to offer, though. Did you go look at this tractor?

HSH's other half - it is a German diesel, 4 cylinder, overhauled a few years ago due to water getting in the crankcase. It has new, wet sleeves. That's most of what I know about it. I'm hoping since it's a pretty new overhaul, this shouldnt have happened (spun a bearing) and maybe it was due to too much oil. I mean, it was way too much oil in there. I know, it didn't make sense how much oil they had in there, I can't explain it, they seemed like guys who knew enough to know how to check an oil gauge at least! But he told me on the phone after we had made the deal that he wanted to change the hydro oil before he sent it to me, and when it got here it was spilling out the dipstick tube. He also said he changed the engine oil, but not the oil filter, and I did not think to check it before I ran it. After the incident, I of course checked it and it was a good 2 to 3 inches over the full mark on the dipstick! I dunno why - maybe they just believed in pouring the oil in until it comes out the top or something!
The oil does not smell like diesel or burnt, or like anything funny that I can tell. The neighbor has said the same. If I spun a bearing, would there be indicators in the oil, besides metal?

Hopefully then it is not drastic , the oil should smell burnt , i do not like ANYTHING in or on a engine to squeal , it normaly spells trouble , an over full engine normaly will blow a seal ,normaly the front timing case seal .or they burn the excess oil there are many things that could have caused these symptoms , i would be very carefull using it and allways have a ear open for different noises developing .
best of luck with it ..

I have seen one of these tractors "make Oil" as indicated from the dipstick. The problem was it had antifreeze in the crankcase due to a sleeve not seating on the o ring that seals the sleeve to the block. The block had rusted pits in the seal area from not changing the antifreeze and all the rust inhibitors were consumed. The coolant in the engine looked like chocolate milk.

OK a little back ground here on IH diesel. For some reason they have a tendency to bore holes in the sleeves cause coolant into the oil. This is called cavation. For the most part if you use a heavy duty anti freeze it has adatives to stop this. Or you can add them from time to time too. The occurs in all diesel engines. You may notice on newer engines the use of coolant filters. Usally they also have the additive in the filter too.
Now back to this engine. I have not had any experince on this engien in the IH's. But, if it spun a main you should not hear much of a noise due to its location. Many times the eninges pulls down real hard and labors till it spins or some thign breaks or locks up. If you head a very aduable noise then likely it will be a bearing in the water pump or alternator. If the belt is good and tight on the alternator it will just about kill the tracotr at the load and rpms you where under. This will also cause the visual smoke you seen at the front of the motor. For vapor or smoke to come out of the crank case it would have to exit the breather tube or blow the front sel out of the engine. With the level of oil you have in it it would been leaking all over the place.
With that much oil in it the engine will also be under a load due to the crank whiping through the oil. But teh dip stick should have been pushed out if there was to much pressure in the crank case.
If you want to give me a call just ask I will give you my number.
out of high school I went to SWTC for 2 yrs fro ag mech. Then came back to the farm and used the schooling to fix our stuff and a few tractors on the side. It keeps the repair costs low.
Later
Bob
PS Take one drop of oil on to a piece of paper towel watch how fast it spreads. If diluted it will spread fast.

Well, the neighbor didn't show up tonight, but I went and drained the oil into a clean container. I did see some very fine particles that were hard to tell if they were metal or dirt. They were about the size of a grain of sand, or silt. I would say it looked like silt. But there were some larger sized pieces, not too many, about the size of a head of a pin no the oil drain pan edges.
Then I ran my finger around just inside the drain hole, and my finger came out with flecks on it, and it looked silver-y colored. And that did smell like diesel to me. :(

So now I am feeling pretty sick again about the whole prognosis. I saved all the oil and filter for the neighbor to take over and have looked at by the guys I am pretty certain are going to be the ones who will work on this tractor for me, unless this is out of their league. If that's the case....I dunno.

btw, madsaw, I was talking with the IH mechanic again today as I was in there to get more oil, and he told me the reason those sleeves get holes in them is due to electrolysis happening, and if the coolant isn't kept fresh enough, it will happen more and eventually wear holes in the sleeves, allowing the coolant to leak out. He said to prevent this, coolant should be changed out every two or three years. Which is probably all another way of saying what you just said.

Thank you for taking the time to do that, Agmantoo. I'm afraid you may be right. Oy. A repair like this....is it going to equal the value of the tractor?