Diesel in Gas Engine - now what?

[jk96]

Sent one of the kids who work for me to fill up my diesel can for my tractor a few days ago. Today, grabbed my red can and put in a couple of gallons of gas in my grasshopper 932 (gas engine). Tank was already half full. Mowed for about 30 minutes before I started noticing engine smoke and loss of power. Turns out he filled my red can with diesel and not the yellow can.

I emptied the tank, refilled, changed plugs and fuel filter. Mower runs fine now until the engine is put under load such as in thicker grass. It is bogging down easily and doesn't seem to have the power it should have now. Should the carberator be cleaned due to the heavier viscosity of the diesel fuel? Any permanant damage? Anything else that needs to be done? Thanks for any suggestions.

 

[xPosTech]

Any smoke now? How did the plugs look? Carboned up or just oily? By carboned up I mean would carbon flake off in chunks from the electrode?

If the plugs were carboned up that's what the combustion chambers are like. Carbon on the top of the piston, head, valves, etc. If it's not too bad Sea Foam might clear it up; otherwise the heads need to come off and de-carboned.

If you're lucky the muffler could be partially plugged up. If it has spark arresters they could be plugged as well. Maybe not so lucky with the price of some mufflers. I don't know if you could clean them out or not.

Just my opinion. Others will know more than I do. Maybe someone has been through this before. What does your dealer say?

Good luck.
Ted

 

[oldmech]

Ok! I think some diesel stay in the tank and carburator. The best remove and rinse the tank. remove and clean carburator. No more trouble. Good Luck! Oldmech

 

[jk96]

Thanks guys. Old Mech, I think your right. I removed the gas tank and completely emptied it. Haven't touched the carburator yet but after mowing for 30 minutes or so today she started coming back to life and now seems to be operating normally. Plenty of power and no smoke. Just glad it was diesel in a gas engine and not gas in a diesel engine. Thanks again.

jk

 

[dqdave1]

add some type of Carb cleaner to your gas, it will help clean up carb and valves and combustion area. Seafoam has been mentioned and works very well.

 

[xPosTech]

Glad to hear it's feeling better.

Is an admonishment to the hired help in order? Or does he feel bad enough already? I doubt if he will ever make that mistake again.

Ted

 

[jk96]

He's a good kid and hard worker. Kind of hard to find these days. We do have the yellow and red cans figured out now. I'm just glad it was diesel that was put into my used grasshopper and not gas that was put into my DX45 tractor. That would have been a hard one to get over. I will definitely do a smell test before pouring in the future.

I did add some STP treatment before I finished mowing this afternoon. No more smoke and everything seems fine.

jk

 

[jinman]

Thanks guys. Old Mech, I think your right. I removed the gas tank and completely emptied it. Haven't touched the carburator yet but after mowing for 30 minutes or so today she started coming back to life and now seems to be operating normally. Plenty of power and no smoke. Just glad it was diesel in a gas engine and not gas in a diesel engine. Thanks again.

jk

I think you just had to run that engine until the diesel was all burned out. It's all history now, but I doubt you would have had much deposit in your engine before discovering the problem. As you say, you are lucky to have not added gasoline to your tractor.

I grew up with an old Ferguson TO-20 gasoline tractor that my dad always swore could run on kerosene. We never tried it to my knowledge, but he said that during WWII when gasoline was in short supply that many people ran their cars on kerosene. I do know at least a couple of mechanics who used to put diesel, kerosene, or light oil into the gasoline as an "upper cylinder lubricant" to lubricate the valve stems inside the intake and exhaust ports. In those days, the gasoline engines were generally higher compression than today's engines, so the kerosene story might be true.

 

[CJ4]

Jinman,

You're not the only one that's heard that from their dad. My dad was one of the ole "true mechanics" and i've seen him pour ATF directly in a carb while holding it at a high idle to do the "upper lube" thing. The sucker would smoke like a house afire and then when it settled down the ole engine would purr like a kitten.