MF 2660 Perkins Smoke

Dmacleo · Dec 5, 2022

the color issue, as posted, is why I thought of coolant.

heres the thing, a fuel issue CAN put extra smoke out the stack that is SO light it APPEARS to be blue and white.

key is determining if its ACTUALLY got white in the output, mixed with another color.

white alone will NEVER be fuel.

white with other stuff (colors matter, make some kid run behind you with camera) is STILL a coolant issue as long as there actually IS white there.
asking for a friend, you got a dumbass friend willing to run and video stuff?
it would help.
just saying....

the coolant/white issue is not a diesel only issue, same phenomenon carries over into gas engines.

when you've cracked 2 cylinders in a 340hp/455ft lbs tq 322 stroker gas engine and can empty a radiator out your 2 3" tailpipes in 7 minutes you'll know what I mean.
so much white smoke cars behind me on I395 in Bangor,ME pulled over. took me 7 gallons to go 12 miles.

JWR · Dec 6, 2022

Holy cow Dave! As I said in post #20 this only happened that one day (so far) and by the end of a 2.5 hr operating period it was gone. I'm not at all sure what to expect when I can get on the tractor again. While it was smoking I could have rather easily done a video of it using my cell phone but never thought to do that. Still shell shocked at the time. It was so heavy/dense in the main initial period of smoking it would have probably appeared "white" from 300yds away (where it would definitely have been viewable) but sitting 6 feet from the exhaust tip and the edge of the cloud it fur sure had some blue to it.

As the old Region Service rep said -- the coolant level is going to tell us a lot.

lpakiz · Dec 6, 2022

Just for background context, my Diesel Tech instructor (1968) told the class on about the 3rd day:

Black smoke is unburned fuel
White smoke is low compression or water
Blue smoke is lube oil
Still remember that.....

JWR · Dec 6, 2022

lpakiz, tell your instructor that if engine lube oil gets burned in a diesel it will cause a BLACK FOG having nothing in the world to do with unburned fuel. That is if it gets in via the intake. I suspect he probably qualified his remarks by saying under what conditions and cases those rules of thumb apply and when they are wrong.

ROUSTABOUT · Dec 6, 2022

Our NH gets to smoking now and then. Just run a bottle of fuel cleaner in the fuel tank and it clears up. Maybe once or twice a year. We cut hay and bale with it all summer. Rake with another tractor. Probably 2000 rolls this year. It gets used fairly often.

JWR · Dec 6, 2022

ROUSTABOUT said:
Our NH gets to smoking now and then. Just run a bottle of fuel cleaner in the fuel tank and it clears up. Maybe once or twice a year. We cut hay and bale with it all summer. Rake with another tractor. Probably 2000 rolls this year. It gets used fairly often.

When did it start doing that for you? Hours wise. What color smoke?

ROUSTABOUT · Dec 7, 2022

It was a royal blue cloud. Starts building about 10 feet above exhaust pipe. Looks like we got our own private thunderstorm going on. But it clears up for several months after a bottle of cleaner.

ROUSTABOUT · Dec 7, 2022

JWR said:
When did it start doing that for you? Hours wise. What color smoke?

I don't know about the hours. There's a half dozen tractors around here, so I'd be lying if I told you.

redman135 · Dec 7, 2022

Hello JWR, have you checked the radiator fluid level? Blue/white smoke sounds like maybe coolant in the exhaust. Had that happen, but continuous, not intermittant.
Given the intermittant occurance, I think you may have to resort to the elimination method to see what is left, to home in on this problem.
Good Luck, and please keep us updated.

JWR · Dec 7, 2022

redman135 said:
Hello JWR, have you checked the radiator fluid level? Blue/white smoke sounds like maybe coolant in the exhaust. Had that happen, but continuous, not intermittant.
Given the intermittant occurance, I think you may have to resort to the elimination method to see what is left, to home in on this problem.
Good Luck, and please keep us updated.

Thanks redman. I will definitely be checking the coolant level as soon as I can get back to my farm. I have bored everyone by saying over and again it is 330 miles to my farm and I only get there once a month. In the winter I have fewer and fewer excuses to get there but still do anyway. [My wonderful renters run beef cattle on it and are there several times a week.]
I do not want to overreact but the most senior voices I have heard so far say it could be a head gasket or an intercooler leak of coolant into the intake. I would presume this smoking will get nothing but worse (compared to the first incident described in detail in the orig post.) But I really do not know that. I just have to test all I can think of and then run it a lot more.
Besides just checking coolant level (which I have not done for ages) a local dealer suggested that I get a pressure testing rig from NAPA or other automotive sources and run a pressure test on the coolant system. That I can do myself without hauling the tractor someplace nor removing the belts to watch for bubbles in the radiator, etc. I'm shopping for the kit right now.

Yes sir, I will for sure keep you updated but it is going to take time.