NL Genny cylinders full of oil.

[a64pilot]

Just let us know when you get it fixed, what the problem was.
If it has good compression, I’m betting it’s a simple fix, fingers crossed

[Compass790]

Hope you didn't damage something turning it over with oil in the cylinders. I bent the pushrods squirting oil into our engine air intake. But don't worry about that until you get fuel coming outa the injection pump. I'm interested to know what they tell you as well

[Olly75]

So as an update, after several calls to Northern Lights (who are awesome) still not managed to get the fuel running- even with the injector lines loose and the engine being cranked. So changed the contact on the solenoid as it was corroded and also the pre heat relay in the control box (just in case) and have worked out that the solenoid is not getting any power on either the pre heat or when the engine is cranked.

The contacts in the back of the pre heat switch are permanently live no matter whether the switch is depressed or not (which seems a little odd to me), but nothing gets to the solenoid.

Unless someone has a better idea I think Im going to arrange someone to come have a look at it when I get to Cabo next month, as messing with the electrics is probably beyond me.

[a64pilot]

You sure it’s getting fuel to the low pressure pump?
It often will have a wobble lever as part of it that you can pump by hand and get fuel to flow that way out of the final filter.

[Olly75]

Yep, there is a lever in the lift pump that will push fuel through the bleed valve on the secondary filter and then the bleed valve on the return line.

[Compass790]

I would try setting up a gravity feed to the injection pump ( using filtered fuel ) & see if it pumps then. At least that will eliminate that from the equation ( or not)

[model 10]

You probably won't find much help in Cabo. La Paz, Mazatlan or PV are the more likely places.

[Olly75]

Well she runs! Purrs like a kitten with no smoke out the back, so think I may have dodged a bullet (although last time I said that I ended up having to repower the boat....)

Speaking to the NL expert, he thinks that I poured the oil in too quickly and it flooded the dam in the rocker cover. The reason why the genny fired initially for a few seconds afterwards was it burnt off the oil in the cylinders and then ran out of fuel.

As to why I couldn't prime the injectors, well the answer after a couple of days going round in circles was obvious. The pre heat rocker switch is dead. As soon as I bypassed it the solenoid worked and fuel flowed.

One thing about this whole thing is I now know alot more about diagnosing issues than I did last week!

[Compass790]

Originally Posted by Olly75

Well she runs! Purrs like a kitten with no smoke out the back, so think I may have dodged a bullet (although last time I said that I ended up having to repower the boat....)

Speaking to the NL expert, he thinks that I poured the oil in too quickly and it flooded the dam in the rocker cover. The reason why the genny fired initially for a few seconds afterwards was it burnt off the oil in the cylinders and then ran out of fuel.

As to why I couldn't prime the injectors, well the answer after a couple of days going round in circles was obvious. The pre heat rocker switch is dead. As soon as I bypassed it the solenoid worked and fuel flowed.

One thing about this whole thing is I now know alot more about diagnosing issues than I did last week!

Thanks for posting the problem. Helps educate us who follow these sagas. Glad your injection pump is fine ( they are expensive) & you didnt suffer any head or cylinder damage. First I've heard of damaging engine from pouring oil in too fast

[a64pilot]

You can’t pour oil in too fast, there is no dam.
Unless he was thinking that you filled the valve cover completely and then oil ran out of the breather?
That’s possible I guess, about as likely as getting pregnant from a toilet seat, but I guess it could happen.

If I were you, I’d only run it a few hours and change the oil, if it has sat for a long time there could be slight rusting etc that you would want to flush out.
Maybe not, but an oil change never hurts, cheap Insurence.

Oh, and you want to load it up, run it hard for a few hours, turn on all the AC’s etc.
Reason is is to make sure the rings stay seated, and an engine that has sat for a long time is similar to a new one, and running either at low load isn’t good.

[model 10]

The oil would probably need to be an inch deep to leak into a valve guide. These engines often use a seal at the top of the valve, not at the top of the guide, so they might leak a little. It would need to be an old engine though. Captain Ron style?

[Olly75]

The explanation about the oil came from a salty NL engineer of many years who was probably using layman terms as he knew I had no idea what he was talking about, but Ill keep an eye on the back end when Im running it just in case.

Will defo change the oil after a few hours, and run it under load, although I have no AC I have a water maker and a kettle and various other things to plug in.

Who's Captain Ron?!

Next question, when the genny is running it runs the ac panel but doesnt charge the the batteries through the inverter, I suspect that it was wired to charge the batteries through the old ac charger that I removed and replaced with one inverter charger. So does anyone have a wiring diagram for an Onan ac selector that I could use to rewire it? Or would it be easier to just replace it with a modern version.

Pic of the selector switch to follow.

[Olly75]

This is the switch.

There are four double contacts at the back, top left is the Genny, bottom left is shore power, top right feeds the inverter. Bottom right is free, but live when the switch is selected to shore power.

If the makes sense!

[a64pilot]

If the shorepower / generator switch is before the inverter / Charger, then the Charger should function, cause it can’t tell the difference between shore and generator power.
I’d suspect that your inverter is wired before the switch, so that it gets no AC power from the generator but does from shorepower.
Pretty sure that is it, and it’s easy to check and fix if it is. Likely need some wire of course.

[Olly75]

Originally Posted by a64pilot

If the shorepower / generator switch is before the inverter / Charger, then the Charger should function, cause it can’t tell the difference between shore and generator power.
I’d suspect that your inverter is wired before the switch, so that it gets no AC power from the generator but does from shorepower.
Pretty sure that is it, and it’s easy to check and fix if it is. Likely need some wire of course.

I like the sound of easy! How can I check?