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Using ether to start Focus TDCI


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Does anyone know if using ether to start a Focus TDCI can damage the engine?

 

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What is the issue with the car that is causing you to think ether assisted start up is the answer ?

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Fuel filter change I'd assume...  I've used brake cleaner and even deodorant, I reckon it'll be fine. :tongue: 

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10 hours ago, TomsFocus said:

and even deodorant

Did the exhaust smell nice afterwards? Could that be a good way to attract the attentions of the ladies? Perhaps a button on the dash to release the perfume into the intake at just the right moment, and an impressive extra boost of power too, maybe:laugh:

I don't recall seeing it recommended anywhere else, but as the propellant is usually a butane or propane mix, it might work. Not really sure I want to experiment with my own injectors & turbo, but the results of further tests would be useful, and perhaps amusing (in a way!).

Peter.

 

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Haha, yeah it does smell better briefly tbh!  One of my mates genuinely keeps a can of spare deodorant to use as easy start...I thought he was taking the pee!  But it really did work and I've used it a couple of times since with good results lol.  I've always got a can of brake cleaner in the tool box so that's preferable, but if I've ran out, deodorant seems to work perfectly well. :laugh: 

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The issue is that my Focus TDCI (circa 2000) failed to start. The AA turned up ands tried several times to  start it with ether before asking if it had any petrol in it!,  When told it was a diesel  the AA guy stopped with the ether and tried to bump start it.  In the end it was taken to a diesel engine specialist who  noted a strong smell of ether and then ran diagnostics and found the issue was a broken crank sensor.  After replacing the sensor  they found one cylinder was not firing because the injector was blown.  I have complained to the AA and they just told me they do this routinely on diesels and it should not have caused any damage. 

I have looked around on the web and the general view is that you should use either on diesel injection engines fitted with glow plugs.  Is there any official advice about this?

 

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If using ether works, then all good & fine, however I'd suggest you should find the real root cause of the issue, get whatever that is fixed & then the car won't need the ether assisted starts.

 

Using ether is curing the symptom, but not the cause of the issue.

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On 22/06/2016 at 10:43 AM, MPN said:

one cylinder was not firing because the injector was blown.  I have complained to the AA and they just told me they do this routinely on diesels and it should not have caused any damage. 

As soon as I saw the note about pre-ignition, my thought was that detonation could, just possibly, damage an injector.

In a petrol engine, the compression ratio has to be kept relatively low. As the air compresses, its temperature rises, well past the published auto-ignition temperatures for petrol-air mix (280C) or diesel-air mix (256C). However, there is also a time factor (ignition delay), and the petrol engine is designed so the compression stoke is too short & cool to allow auto-ignition. Thus the mix is ignited by the spark at the correct time, and in the correct place. As most drivers will know, even small adjustment to timing or mix in a petrol engine causes pinking (detonation due to pre-ignition).

In a petrol engine, the fuel is fully vapourised and very well mixed with the air, creating a homogenous flammable gas that burns smoothly. If ignited with a spark just before the auto-ignition point, then the flame travels through the gas thermally, at a speed well below the speed of sound. If this mix auto-ignites (in part or whole), then the combustion region can reach the speed of sound, and most of the energy of the fuel goes into the pressure wave so generated (There is a vicious circle, the pressure wave makes the gas temperature rise, speeding up combustion, and this increases the pressure in the wave). When this wave hits a solid object (cylinder or piston), it generates high forces, audible as the "pink" noise.

This is detonation. And it is the difference between a propellant such as gunpowder or cordite burning, and nitro-glycerine detonating. I have seen very small detonations demonstrated, it can blow a hole in a steel plate.

A diesel engine is very different. The fuel is not put in until well into the compression stroke. The gas is already hot enough to cause auto-ignition. The fuel is "atomised" into tiny droplets (which is why very high pressure injection helps - smaller droplets). The mix is highly in-homogeneous (not well mixed), the droplets quickly vapourise and burn, independently. There is little chance for a well defined pressure wave to develop, so no severe detonation can occur. The fuel burns more quickly than in a petrol engine, creating the characteristic diesel knock, but still in a reasonably well controlled manner. Most of the heat in the fuel is released near the top of the expansion (or power) stroke, so more of the heat is converted into the power that we want smile.png from the engine.

If fuel goes into the diesel engine during the intake stroke, ignition is completely uncontrolled, detonation becomes possible, damage to engine parts such as injectors and glowplugs becomes possible. The higher compression ratio could lead to higher detonation pressures.

----

I am afraid I have wandered off the topic a bit. The  key words in the last sentence are "possible". From all the other reports, it seems that damage is very unlikely, it needs something near the optimum (stochiometric) mix to create detonation, and then it has to hit the delicate parts. So I suspect it will be impossible to prove that it was the fault of the AA. Might be worth a letter though, perhaps they might assist out of "goodwill". Bit of a schoolboy error not spotting the TDCI  label on the car!ohmy.png

Peter

 

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I've never heard of it causing any issues on diesels, you'd have to be really unlucky if it did I think!  People use easy-start and the like on diesels all the time.

I know quite a few people that run veg oil in diesels and have to give it a sniff of something to get it going most cold mornings lol.

 

I would like to know why the AA didn't run a diags check first though?  It's quick and he wouldn't have wasted his ether!

 

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5 hours ago, MPN said:

AA .. just told me they do this routinely on diesels and it should not have caused any damage. 

 

4 hours ago, TomsFocus said:

I've never heard of it causing any issues on diesels, you'd have to be really unlucky if it did I think!  People use easy-start and the like on diesels all the time.

I agree with Tom, you would have to be very unlucky, & I said it was highly unlikely.

But there is an underlying possible physical link. The key would be whether the injector problem existed before the Ether (If the specialist was right about the crank sensor, it seems unlikely there would be 2nd fault), and whether the type of damage to the injector is consistent with Ether or detonation.

Not easy to prove, probably. But you might get some goodwill compensation out of the AA if you persuade them politely but firmly. I guess that is what you are really asking about?

And as Tom also queries, why no diagnostic check: a crank sensor fault should show up on a basic generic scanner. AA guys seemed very good while I was a member (up till about 10 years ago), and they are not cheap. Was it a genuine AA man in a van? They do sometimes use contractors in busy periods.

Peter.

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On Tuesday June 21, 2016 at 10:07 AM, MPN said:

Does anyone know if using ether to start a Focus TDCI can damage the engine?


 

Can? Yes. Likely to? No.

I find it a little difficult to believe that a competent and experienced service man can get to the point of spraying the fluid without noticing that it wasn't a petrol in front of him. Maybe he was having a bad day. Given how a TDCI works, I can't see how you can damage it with a reasonable amount of spray, but if you apply a totally unreasonable amount of spray you can bend a rod.


 

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Perhaps the key is the amount of ether used.  My wife tell me the AA guy had several attempt over 20 minutes to get it going and the diesel garage reported a strong smell of ether when they got the car an hour later with enough still in it ether to turn the engine over.  I guess the question is how much is too much.

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The general consensus is that the AA man you had, did not show the level of competence that is generally expected of a professional recovery company, based on the information you have given.

If you gather all the evidence and information, preferably with a report of some kind from the diesel specialist, write it all down clearly, then I think you may have a claim for the cost of the injector. I am no expert on these matters, but that is what I would do.

Peter.

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