Anonymous-0
Well-known Member
A person I know went down to the States to take a coarse on making gas motors run on diesel. I have not seen him to see how he made out. Has anybody ever heard of this?
- Thread starter Anonymous-0
- Start date
Tyler Jackson
Member
Recently got a job at Cummins workin on the diesel engines and I've been woundering about this myself. Wouldn't think it would be to hard to do as long as you get the injection stuff all sorted out and maybe a few other odds and ends.
Anonymous-0
Well-known Member
Im not sure if there would be any advantage to this since the price of diesel is higher than gas up here sometimes
Pair-a-dice farm
Well-known Member
Didn't GM do that back in the 70's? I don't believe it worked out to well.
Anonymous-0
Well-known Member
believe they took the 350 and put diesel heads on them, I believe this is something different and Im not sure what. I thought maybe some one on here might know
WAYNE-N-TX
Member
GM did, did not hold up. That"s why they don't do it anymore.
Had one of those. Full size Chevy station wagon. Retired it in the neighborhood of 250,000 miles. Transmission issues, not engine. Fuel economy was phenominal. When it turned 100,000 miles it was doing 30mpg on freeway, pulling a travel trailer, and loaded to the gills. At the time diesel was half the cost of gasoline, so we made out like a bandit. If you got a good one, they were very good. Like all diesels, it helps if the owner knows how to drive and maintain diesels. They are not gassers.
Anonymous-0
Well-known Member
GM did take a 350 gas and convert it to diesel in the 70's. The biggest problem was the bottom end of engine could not take the higher compresion of diesel heads. Its not a new idea John Deere D would run diesel after geeting up to temperature.
Tony in Mass.
Well-known Member
When I first got my MF Perkins 3 gas, I was wndering why the plugs were so hard to get at, ant all the funky castings on the block, then it accured to me this was set up for either gas or diesel, I think anyway. As I flip thru the diesel pages of the I&T manual, the castings and gearing... all look the same. Yeah the 1970's and 80's GM's didn't cut the mustard. Diesels build higher pressures so I was told. But back then, fuel injected gas was something new too. Lots have changed in 30 years... I hope.
RandyB(MI)
Well-known Member
They had two main problems that they forgot to address when going hi compression. They used same number of head bolts and probably the same strength head bolts because they had a habit of popping the heads off the bolts and blowing the gasket. Also didn't have enough piston rings of sufficient grade to hold the compression. They wore quickly and compression fell and so did ease of starting / batteries and starters failed accordingly. Only other problem they had was the notorious stanadyn pump with the disintegrating plastic governor weight retaining ring. That's been since changed. Oh, did I mention they had NO power? Build diesel from the ground up or forget it.
buickanddeere
Well-known Member
Are you talking about all-fuel engines?
Hardly complex but fuel efficiency with a spark
ignition engine. Running on diesel or gasoline
with a 4 to 1 compression ratio and a heated
intake is lousy.
There was the military version that used a
diesel injection pump with gas and or diesel in
trucks. No prize for efficiency, simplicity or
reliability either.
About all that can be said for either design is
that the engines will run on anything that will
pour and burn.
Coarse is rough. Course is education.
What you want today is a direct injection gasser
for efficiency,price, simplicity and reliability.
Hardly complex but fuel efficiency with a spark
ignition engine. Running on diesel or gasoline
with a 4 to 1 compression ratio and a heated
intake is lousy.
There was the military version that used a
diesel injection pump with gas and or diesel in
trucks. No prize for efficiency, simplicity or
reliability either.
About all that can be said for either design is
that the engines will run on anything that will
pour and burn.
Coarse is rough. Course is education.
What you want today is a direct injection gasser
for efficiency,price, simplicity and reliability.
old
Well-known Member
- Location
- Camdenton Missouri
Sorry not going to run unless you do a lot of modifications to them. Ya it can be done like on the old JD all fuel tractors but to make a car or truck run no way and even then the EPA would stop it in a heart beat. Years ago I would run a gal. of diesel to a tank of gas in my Dodge van to work as an upper lube but the day I messed up and had 5 gal in a tank it sure ran bad till I could top it off
Im pretty sure the 6.5 liter diesel in chevy's use the same block as
a chevy 350 gas. Im not sure about anything else. Old deuce and a
halfs could run on anything that was combustable. Pretty cool
trucks. I think I herd a story once about taking unrefined oil and
putting it into one? But I know they can run on gas/diesel/kero
without a problem
a chevy 350 gas. Im not sure about anything else. Old deuce and a
halfs could run on anything that was combustable. Pretty cool
trucks. I think I herd a story once about taking unrefined oil and
putting it into one? But I know they can run on gas/diesel/kero
without a problem
willie in mn
Well-known Member
IIRC, & will stand corrected if wrong, but wasn't it the 6.2 liter that was based on the 350 gas? The 6.5 was an entirely different animal.
International mid sized trucks had one even weirder. Took the 549 cu in 4 barrel gas, converted it to the DV550 diesel. At idle it ran on 4, the other 4 just coasted along. Kick it about 100 rpm above idle & the other cylinders cut in. After a few years it became the 9 liter diesel V8, running on all 8 all the time. Strong & dependable in for mid range use, especially school busses.
WJ
International mid sized trucks had one even weirder. Took the 549 cu in 4 barrel gas, converted it to the DV550 diesel. At idle it ran on 4, the other 4 just coasted along. Kick it about 100 rpm above idle & the other cylinders cut in. After a few years it became the 9 liter diesel V8, running on all 8 all the time. Strong & dependable in for mid range use, especially school busses.
WJ
MarkB_MI
Well-known Member
- Location
- Motown USA
Sounds like another case of Yankees taking advantage of Canadian rubes.
Ultradog MN
Well-known Member
- Location
- Twin Cities
Sounds about like the 3 cylinder Ford engines.
I took a 201 ci gas engine in hand this spring - switched the head, pistons, intake manifold and installed an IP and lines in place of the distributer.
Viola! It's now a diesel.
That's hardly like running a gasser on diesel though. Maybe if you added enough snake oil to the fuel it would run...
I took a 201 ci gas engine in hand this spring - switched the head, pistons, intake manifold and installed an IP and lines in place of the distributer.
Viola! It's now a diesel.
That's hardly like running a gasser on diesel though. Maybe if you added enough snake oil to the fuel it would run...
buickanddeere
Well-known Member
The last year or two of the Olds diesel adventure. The bean counters relented and let the engineers build the engine that way they originally designed it.
High allow block, roller cam etc. Good engine but the power was low and the reputation was tainted.
The diesel owners of that era didn't do the Olds engines any good either. Many so called failures were due to the lack of oil changes.And dim witted owners putting gasoline in the tank.
High allow block, roller cam etc. Good engine but the power was low and the reputation was tainted.
The diesel owners of that era didn't do the Olds engines any good either. Many so called failures were due to the lack of oil changes.And dim witted owners putting gasoline in the tank.
I worked at Detroit Diesel Allison (then a division of GM) when Olds introduced the diesel. I owned 5 of them. (Cutlasses & Toronados and a Grand Prix). The engineers at DDA all said to get rid of them before 50k miles, which I did. They were great while I owned them and with my employee discount (which was pretty good back then) I actually sold some of them for more than I paid for them. The Cutlasses and Grand Prix were pretty noisy. But they ended up being an engineering/marketing disaster. I heard an unverified story that one exec even figured that a short life for a diesel car meant the owner would have to buy a new one sooner rather than later.
I left GM because I got a few promotions and as I got closer to the decision makers, I just couldn't see myself working for such arrogant and incompetent managers the rest of my career. Most of them were just concerned with making themselves look good to get their next promotion. Why did GM fail? Look back to the era of Gerstenberg, Murphy, Smith, Stempel, etc. As B&D says, the culture created by the bean-counters over the years made failure inevitable.
buickanddeere
Well-known Member
You are kidding right?
My parents had a early 80's Pontiac Parisienne with the 5.7l diesel conversion. Yup, it was a garbage engine! I replaced the head gaskets once, there was a head bolt upgrade at the time to something of higher strength. It did run ok after that but there were many other problems with that car, the transmission being one of them.
It was pretty gutless until you got over 55mph, after that it would float right along. Very comfortable car and I think the fuel mileage was ok but back then I wasn't too concerned with that.
It was pretty gutless until you got over 55mph, after that it would float right along. Very comfortable car and I think the fuel mileage was ok but back then I wasn't too concerned with that.
Common misconception that those were conversions since it was the 350ci engine size. It was NOT, the diesels were a much stronger block which was made only for the diesel application and is now highly prized by the hotrod crowd.
As an aside that engine and the 4.3 made about the same time are, at least in my mind, why Americans hate diesels so bad. The 5.3l made something like 110hp. In 1979 Mercedes Benz brought out a 3.0l 5 cylinder turbo diesel making 120hp. GM's engines were bigger and clunkier and didn't make the power they should have considering the displacement and fuel consumption. Oh, the 3.0l in the IH Scout made 101hp, so not as good as the MB but still better than the GM so it wasn't just Benz beating them...
As an aside that engine and the 4.3 made about the same time are, at least in my mind, why Americans hate diesels so bad. The 5.3l made something like 110hp. In 1979 Mercedes Benz brought out a 3.0l 5 cylinder turbo diesel making 120hp. GM's engines were bigger and clunkier and didn't make the power they should have considering the displacement and fuel consumption. Oh, the 3.0l in the IH Scout made 101hp, so not as good as the MB but still better than the GM so it wasn't just Benz beating them...
buickanddeere
Well-known Member
I doubt if you do know when you are asking for an example.
charles todd
Well-known Member
2008 to the present MINI Coopers have direct injection gasoline engines. I own one. It gets 38 mpg on the highway/33 in town and will stay with a Mustang GT on the strip.
CT
CT
buickanddeere
Well-known Member
217 cu" natural aspirated V6 in the Camero makes 323 net HP in emissions trim.
Yes, the confusion comes that The Olds diesel used as many gas engine design features as possible to cut costs, as GM was on a fools errand , trying to build a cheap diesel engine to justify it when diesel fuel or gas was little or any over $1 per gallon.
The Oldsmobile diesel used the 5.7 displacement, but the block crank, rods heads were much heavier built. I remember that it used the 455 olds main bearing size to beef that up a bit.
Seems I remember the diesel 350 using the gas 350 head bolt pattern and number of bolts, which was one of the failings. Hard to hold 20/1 compression plus diesel detonation whth that little clamping force.
The tall gearing and Roosamaster(Standine) diesel pump did not help either, the governor design would tip the fuel metering valve wide open with only 1/2 throttle applied at idle.
That wide open injection system on a cold, weak built(cast iron crankshaft) diesel could not live long. Most died by 50,000 miles.
It did not help that GM would not market them as a diesel engine that needed a little warm up / cool down and special care compared to gas, they marketed them as an oldsmobile that burned diesel fuel and got good mpg.
My first impression of the Olds 5.7 diesel turned out to be correct.
I was walking down the sidewalk in winter 1978 ?. I saw a fellow come out of a store and jump in his new GM car with the diesel emblem.
I just stopped and watched him, as i had never seen one run and I wanted to hear him start / drive it from cold(hood was covered with fresh unmelted snow, so it was cold.
The drives in his thin jacket shivered while waiting for the glowplugs to heat, he cranked it and it lit off like a typical cold diesel, black smoke and lots of diesel clatter. Immediatly after it lit off the guy tossed it into reverse and rattled his way into the street, he tossed it in drive and took off down the street in a cloud of rattle rattle black smoke.
My thought at the moment was" how can you treat a diesel engine like that and have it live very long ??"
History proved he could not.
The 6.2 / 6.5 were a partial Detroit Diesel design. ( the setup looked to me like it was loosly based on the Detriot 8.2 fuel pincher).
They were a better engine, but still had block and head cracking problems and were low on power for their size. Adding another lubrication passage and bolting on a turbocharger made the 6.5 block even less reliable than the 6.2.
GM pickups really never had a decent diesel until they swallowed their pride and got in bed with Isuzu to build the Duramax diesels.
A lot of that converted gas engine story comes from the use of some gas engine design features, although their were few if any parts the same on the Olds gas and diesel engines.
Also adding to the confusion was that every GM division had their own 350-400-450 CI gas V8's with no interchange between them.
The Oldsmobile diesel used the 5.7 displacement, but the block crank, rods heads were much heavier built. I remember that it used the 455 olds main bearing size to beef that up a bit.
Seems I remember the diesel 350 using the gas 350 head bolt pattern and number of bolts, which was one of the failings. Hard to hold 20/1 compression plus diesel detonation whth that little clamping force.
The tall gearing and Roosamaster(Standine) diesel pump did not help either, the governor design would tip the fuel metering valve wide open with only 1/2 throttle applied at idle.
That wide open injection system on a cold, weak built(cast iron crankshaft) diesel could not live long. Most died by 50,000 miles.
It did not help that GM would not market them as a diesel engine that needed a little warm up / cool down and special care compared to gas, they marketed them as an oldsmobile that burned diesel fuel and got good mpg.
My first impression of the Olds 5.7 diesel turned out to be correct.
I was walking down the sidewalk in winter 1978 ?. I saw a fellow come out of a store and jump in his new GM car with the diesel emblem.
I just stopped and watched him, as i had never seen one run and I wanted to hear him start / drive it from cold(hood was covered with fresh unmelted snow, so it was cold.
The drives in his thin jacket shivered while waiting for the glowplugs to heat, he cranked it and it lit off like a typical cold diesel, black smoke and lots of diesel clatter. Immediatly after it lit off the guy tossed it into reverse and rattled his way into the street, he tossed it in drive and took off down the street in a cloud of rattle rattle black smoke.
My thought at the moment was" how can you treat a diesel engine like that and have it live very long ??"
History proved he could not.
The 6.2 / 6.5 were a partial Detroit Diesel design. ( the setup looked to me like it was loosly based on the Detriot 8.2 fuel pincher).
They were a better engine, but still had block and head cracking problems and were low on power for their size. Adding another lubrication passage and bolting on a turbocharger made the 6.5 block even less reliable than the 6.2.
GM pickups really never had a decent diesel until they swallowed their pride and got in bed with Isuzu to build the Duramax diesels.
A lot of that converted gas engine story comes from the use of some gas engine design features, although their were few if any parts the same on the Olds gas and diesel engines.
Also adding to the confusion was that every GM division had their own 350-400-450 CI gas V8's with no interchange between them.
charles todd
Well-known Member
I meant the MINI Cooper S has a DI engine. The S model has a turbo. 1.6L turbo DI engine, 178hp and a flat torque curve.
CT
Wesley Stephens
Member
I've been reading about the Ford EcoBoost direct injected gas motors. They sound interesting, but time will tell how they hold up. Speaking of diesel in a gas motor, I was in a hurry after dark one time and dumped some highway diesel in our MF 35 gas that was bone dry. (I just saw that it wasn't red and took off). It was a little hard to start but once it got warmed up it ran fairly well. I was doing light work so I went ahead and burned out the diesel before I put gas back in it. I saw an F-600 once with a 361 that had 5 gal of diesel dumped in it and 10 gal of gas to dilute it when they realized the problem. It idled a little rough but otherwise ran decently.
buickanddeere
Well-known Member
Near diesel compression for improved mechanical efficiency. Cheap fuel per gallon. Improved detonation resistance. No raw air/fuel mixture out the exhaust valve at low rpms with high overlap cams.Improved fuel atomization. No obstruction of airflow through the intake valve with fuel in the way.
The advantages of diesel with being lightweight and simpler. Wide a rpm range, lots of torque, lots of HP. Better cold weather starting than diesel. Less cold start emissions.
The advantages of diesel with being lightweight and simpler. Wide a rpm range, lots of torque, lots of HP. Better cold weather starting than diesel. Less cold start emissions.
Tony in Mass.
Well-known Member
I think we are on the same page, but Ford didn't like to use the word 'Perkins', so's I was told by an old ford guy who was looking at mine a while ago. He thought his 3000? was a twin to my 135..
2cylpartsinfo
Member
As stated earlier the last Olds engines with 350DX (rarher than 350D) cast in the block were decent but not super.
We also put some gas heads and manifold on one it it really ran well.
Don't forget the two cylinder John Deere diesel engines were based on an overbuilt gasoline design. They added a center main bearing between the two cylinders and alloy's to the casting. The only problem the diesels had was some flywheels came loose from the engine trying to run backwards during shut down. It was fixed to an extent (not fully) with a camshaft change. The aftermarket came up with the taper lock flywheel.
We also put some gas heads and manifold on one it it really ran well.
Don't forget the two cylinder John Deere diesel engines were based on an overbuilt gasoline design. They added a center main bearing between the two cylinders and alloy's to the casting. The only problem the diesels had was some flywheels came loose from the engine trying to run backwards during shut down. It was fixed to an extent (not fully) with a camshaft change. The aftermarket came up with the taper lock flywheel.
buickanddeere
Well-known Member
The Deere didn't have flywheel problems until Bubba and his Uncle Cheapskate decided to try an engine rebuild.
#1 With no service manual to know the torque and lacking a torque wrench. They either over tightened the flywheel bolts which causes them to stretch and loose tension. Or they didn't torque the bolts tight enough. Either way the flywheel wasn't clamped tight enough to the splines and it would work loose.
#2 Cam change, pure B.S. to stop flywheels from shaking loose. It was to keep baffled operators from test operating the tractor in all seven gear selections. As the engine ran backwards without lube oil pressure for several minutes.
#1 With no service manual to know the torque and lacking a torque wrench. They either over tightened the flywheel bolts which causes them to stretch and loose tension. Or they didn't torque the bolts tight enough. Either way the flywheel wasn't clamped tight enough to the splines and it would work loose.
#2 Cam change, pure B.S. to stop flywheels from shaking loose. It was to keep baffled operators from test operating the tractor in all seven gear selections. As the engine ran backwards without lube oil pressure for several minutes.
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