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Exhaust Color
let us elaborate about exhaust color, as many technicians has many
questions and wondering about the exhaust color and what is the
indication of abnormal color.
In diesel engines mostly the normal exhaust color is very light gray, in
electronically controlled engine, it seems to be colorless, but due to
engine problem, the exhaust color changes into:
Black smoke.
Blue smoke.
White smoke.
Now someone will ask a question, does exhaust smoke mean my engine
is dying? The answer is not necessarily.
The color of the smoke can reveal much about the state of health of your
engine.
Sometimes, it means the need for a few adjustments; or periodic service
is due, other times, it means the need for a new set of piston rings or
cylinder head gasket, or valve seals or valve lapping.
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There are three main reasons why the engine might be smoking:
A rich fuel mixture often causes black smoke.
A coolant leak often causes white smoke.
Oil in the combustion chambers often causes blue smoke.
Only the last two problems indicate serious trouble.
Before you decide on expensive repairs, you need to make a preliminary
diagnosis.
Before we jump to that stage, let us understand what is meant by rich
mixture, as we know that to burn fuel (diesel) we need air to be mixed
with diesel in accordance to specified ratio which called AIR FUEL
RATIO, we can consider that the ratio in diesel engines is 1:14.5, that
means to burn one gram (gm) of fuel which is Diesel, you need 14.5 gram
(gm) of air, and to burn 10 gm of fuel you need 145 gm of air.
If for a reason or another, you abuse this ratio by injecting more fuel than
this ratio, we call this case rich mixture, and you will get black smoke,
to fix this problem, you need to calibrate fuel pump and adjust injectors.
Faulty fuel pump and injectors are mainly the root cause of black smoke
but not the lonely reason for black smoke, there are many reasons for
getting black smoke, for instance clogged air filter, faulty turbocharger,
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air leakage from connections, incorrect injection timing, incorrect gear
timing, Emission control system problems, restricted intake duct or
manifold, worn valves and or valve seats.
As we all know that black exhaust smoke usually happens when you
either accelerate or when you start turbocharged engine.
To decide about exhaust color, allow the engine to reach operating
temperature. This will take about 10 to 20 minutes, depending on your
model.
Slowly accelerate and decelerate the engine.
Check the color of the smoke coming out of the exhaust pipe and whether
it's associated with acceleration or deceleration.
In the coming chapter I will demonstrate white smoke.
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