John Deere 450B will not crank

[Mattn]

Hello,
I am new to the site, I purchased a 1972 John Deere 450B crawler dozer a few weeks ago. It was not running when I purchased it but the seller did turn the engine over to show me it was not locked up l. When I got the dozer home I noticed the fuel filter with the glass bowl was empty so I pulled the seat up turned the fuel valve open and proceeded to prime the fuel system. So after breaking all the lines lose I could not get fuel to the injectors. I went ahead and used the timing window and pin to set the #1cylinder on the compression stroke. Pulled the pump had it rebuilt, purchased four new injectors, new fuel lines, new filters, and drained the tank then put new fuel in the machine. So now I am getting fuel to the injectors there is smoke coming out the muffler when I turn it over but it will not fire off. I purchased new batteries it turns over hard but just will not fire. Anyone have any thoughts on this?

[Stan Disbrow]

Hi,

White smoke? Probably running way lean with some air still in the lines. Keep cranking periodically, and it will probably change to running poorly. Eventually it will straighten out. I say crank periodically so you don't burn up the starter.

Stan

[Mattn]

Thanks for the reply! It puffs out white smoke from what I can tell. I didn't mention in my post but thank goodness I have a new starter. I will try to turn it over periodically this afternoon again and see if it will crank. I hope the compression is good. I purchased a book on the machine but it does not have any details about checking the compression.

[Mattn]

Well I finally got back out to my crawler project this afternoon. I turned it over periodically, stopping for 10min in-between cranking for around an hour and a half with no luck on it firing up. The crawler still turning over hard puffing white smoke out

[amos]

Just found your post. If it hasn't yet started I may be inclined to think the re-built injector pump was installed 180 degrees out of time. Easy to do that.Easy to fix: remove pump,rotate shaft 180 degrees and re-install.
White smoke indicates fuel getting to cylinders but pump out of timing means it's not getting there on compression stroke.

[Mattn]

Thanks for the reply, I have not had much time to work on my project lately. But I have not gotten it running yet. I will give that a try soon. Thanks again!

[pondhogvt]

As Amos said the pump could be out 180,,, it is just a simple screw driver type of slot...

but instead of just pulling it and guessing it's out 180.... when you pull the pump don't move anything without looking inside first...

there is a little circle like a period on one side of the pump shaft sticking out of the engine,, right on the end,, that will correspond to a little circle on the inside of the pump slot.. line them up and you should be good to go for static timing anyway,, they must line up.

if when you pull it and they were lined up all along.. then you have another problem..

good luck Mark

[amos]

Mark explained it better: do look for those timing marks.Another way to check is to disconnect injector fuel lines at the injector pump then find top dead center on number 1 cylinder.Mark the fan pulley(white out or a pencil type paint marker) on the same side of the unit as the injector pump to use as a reference and then have someone crank the engine over and look for a squirt of diesel from the #1 fuel line port at the injector pump when the reference mark on the pulley is indicating you're at TDC on #1 cylinder.
This is NOT how you time the injector pump but just a way to do a quick check for rough timing:I buy "dead" equipment often and this is how I check rough timing when the engine won't start.
When you have the lines off of the injector pump also look for that same squirt of diesel as the pump is spun through a full circle of travel.Flow rate through the pump is low in volume so it doesn't make a huge mess and if you do not see a squirt of diesel at each port just keep tracing back to find blockage is fuel system.
I have never found a clean fuel tank on any piece of earth moving equipment and a quick way to establish fuel line flow is to back blow the fuel lines into the fuel tank with compressed air.If that fixes the low supply flow condition then you know to clean the tank.

[Mattn]

Hey guy's thanks for all the good information. The fella that rebuilt my pump told me he set the pump up for the TDC installation. He did tell me to make sure the pump shaft was lined up dot to dot, he showed me the inside of the pump and told me the dot on the shaft should be in the same orientation as the dot in the slot for installation. If they were not then I was 180 off. So on the install the dots were lined up nicely. I hope this helps. I have not blown the line to the tank out but I did drain the tank and put new fuel in.


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