Lister CD 8HP named Ray

Well for the last few years Ray, named after Pa, because he used to listen to one the same that pumped water from the river to the diary and take him back in time. Anyway, Ray was misbehaving when I last had him out from under the covers and finally I made an effort to get him running again. Did all the usual stuff checked the fluids all round and had to top up the oil tank after I pumped it back from the sump to the tank. Some idiot, me, forgot to turn the oil tap off. I added about a litre of oil and that would mean the tank would have at least 5 litres in it. I removed the glass bowl at the fuel tap and cleaned it up then did the same with the plastic bowl on the fuel filter. Not a lot of crud there but there is none now. Topped the radiator up and removed the bomb proof rocker cover that weighs a ton to inspect and lubricate the rockers as told to do as a start up procedure in the manual. With all this done out with the 'starter motor, the crank handle, and 2 swings on the crank, drop the decomp lever and away he went. He sounds so good when running and I know why Pa loved it so much. I was waiting for the problem to arise, a slow stop as it was seizing up. Wind the engine backwards and it would go again but this time it continued to run fairly well.
Then a funny sound and I knew that I had a fuel issue. Some idiot forgot to open the fuel tap and in the video you can see at the bottom of the fuel filter a lot of air which should not be there. So start bleeding the system. There is a bleed screw on top of the housing and got fuel dribbling out there. So I made an attempt to start but no still air in the system. So removed the injector line from the top of the pump and cranked and cranked until a good dribble of fuel came out there. Connected that back up and went around to the injector and took the line off up there. More cranking finally gets results of fuel dribbling the same amount. All good lets start up again. Checked fuel and oil taps are open and cranked away and off he went again. Running happily until it stopped again as if it was starving for fuel again. At least it is not locking up now. So tomorrow I will get back into the full length of the fuel system looking for restrictions and go from there. You can see that Ray gets a slight bounce up sometimes but not always and without touching anything it settles. Maybe the governor is a bit sticky and slightly changing the revs.



View:

Hooray for Ray, little bit of sunshine ain't he?

Yes he was and yes he is now again. Miss the ol' fella dearly and for me now brings me meories of him too. When this came home it was not running and Pa was getting worse in health and I wanted to show it to him running. Took a short cut and looped the oil pipes up using flexible hose and 3 clamps at each end to hold it on. Bloody hell one end blew off and covered him in jet black diesel sump oil, fortunately not hot. It did take a lot for me not to laugh but I did have to say that I never knew how blue his eyes were until he was blackened.
I quickly wiped him down, sent him to the showers and gave him some of my clothes.

Here is the latest. It appears that I now have all the air out of the fuel system so that is a good thing. I wanted to double check the oil pressure where the original non working gauge sits as this is the end of the oil line after running through the crank shaft. I know this gauge is as old as I am but it works and shows 26 psi which is more than the manual asks for of 15 - 20 psi.

So I started Ray up again and he was happily ticking over with the rack held open using that little metal lug which would roughly be about 1/4 throttle. HE ran for quite some time but then it started to lock up as it did before and I still had oil pressure. In order to free it up I use a set of stillsons to wind it backwards to allow it to let go. I felt the head and I could leave my bare hand on it and the top of the radiator was only just warm. I feel I have plenty of coolant in the system because I opened the drain cock at the bottom of the block and the level went down in the radiator.

Is there a bleed screw for trapped air in the head that I dont know about?

So I let it sit there for about 10 minutes and started him up again and as usual he always fires up easily. This time the lock happened a bit earlier so I am thinking that maybe it has something to do with temperature of the engine, but what?

Could there be a cracked ring that would or could cause this

A mate of mine has a Hornsby engine that he had not started for a long time. When he eventually went to start it, the piston would bind up in one spot in the cylinder and it was impossible to turn the engine over.

Problem ended up being the water jacket was completely rusted up, so much so that the rust was forcing the cylinder wall inwards, and when the piston got to that spot it would jam.

He took the head off and cleaned the water jacket out, then honed the cylinder and it runs ok again now.

Brett.

Cheers Brett,
I had that problem with the McDonald and was boosted by the piston having a bulge in the skirt as well and how that happened is anyones guess.
I have been on the Lister and other Forums with this bugga and at the moment my plan of attack is to lift the head off and piston out. That way I can check the bore top to bottom, inspect the rings and main bearing as well. These are the things high on my list of possibilities.
NEw rings are available as std and possibly oversized and I have checked the prices for ring sets and gaskets as well. Other parts are not listed but are available like bearings. So after checking the condition of the bore and measuring it with the internal micometer if they go to 4.5" I then can make a plan to fix poor Ray up and have him running right once again. Not sure if higher oil pressure can cause my problem so I will set it back to spec of 15-20 psi. That way it is one less thing to not have to think about. So the fun will begin on Boxing Day.

Forgive me for stating the obvious, the sump oil level is high enough to allow the rod to dip, yes?

Jarrod.

Had Lanz Bulldog doing just that what Ray is doing, and it was the lack of oil getting to the piston

An idea floated to me was if the dipper was facing the right way on the bottom of the conrod.
I dont know as yet because I have not been inside. I dont know if it actually has a dipper on this model.
But this is a dry sump arrangement and that maybe lubricated by pressure, again I dont know as yet.
Tomorrow is the day to get inside Rays' guts and find out.
The manual for want of a better term is basic at best and pictures are very detailed so much so that the details over run each other.
Thank you for any and all ideas, keep them comming if you think of anything.

Started the strip down today. Radiator and fuel tank off then the oil tank as well followed by the crankcase cover near the oil tank. Once that was off I could see the bottom of the skirt of the piston and it was very wet with oil which is what I wanted to see.

Does anyone know how this gets oil on it here as there is no sign of a scoop on the conrod but there is a funny shape on the insides of the counterweights that might do the scooping?
But being a dry sump where is the oil being picked up from?

Lister win the race for worlds longest head studs. Never seen anything this long before. Head off and there is no movement in the piston at TDC or anywhere down the bore to BDC. Bore looks great with a small amount of carbon around the top which will have to be removed to lift the piston up and out.