Good times in BFE last night..

On my way home from Tennessee last night and my belt tensioner starts seizing up. I do what I can to keep it spinning but eventually it locked completely up. The back road I was on is out in the boonies all the way to my house. No gas stations, no cell service, not much traffic if at all during the night.

I know what’s going to happen, but without much option I fire it up and keep trucking. Make some good distance before I hear the belt pop and now I am 38 miles from home. Whale sht. I’m not sleeping out here and sure as hell not walking so I fire it up and figure out I can make it about a mile before the temp gauge gets to 200. I shut it down and the gauge creeps to about 220 or so and about 30 minutes later I can do it all over again. I know what you’re thinking, that gauge probably isn’t reading actual temp and there are hot spots and steam pockets with no coolant flow.

Took me 4 hours to make the 38 miles home. Pretty bummed that I might have smoked this old engine. First thought is possible head warpage from the temps being hottest there (I assume). Second thought is cylinder scoring. I’m putting a new tensioner and belt on now and hope that it runs the same afterwards. Hopefully the oil temp didn’t get too hot on those short runs but who knows. What a sht show. The only good thing that can come of this is maybe that single cab common rail for sale on here lol.

Oil usually is 12-20* hotter then coolant temps. Depending on the quality of oil and/or additives used, it starts to break down and deplete in the 242* range, quality depending it goes up from there and typical “fleet” oils bearing failure occurs @250*. Seems you walked the line on that one, for your sake I hope it’s the low side of the line. Good luck.

Yep. Probably pushed it too far. I’ll go ahead and do an oil change. Really bugs me that I didn’t have a tensioner in the spare parts bin I keep behind the seat.

I do like the truck a lot, but it’s a rusty old 95 with 320,000 miles on it. I won’t be happy if it’s toast, but I’m not gonna cry about it either.

Do tensioner's go bad often? Sucks to hear, and crossing my fingers you somehow dodged a bullet...

WUnderwood said:

Do tensioner's go bad often? Sucks to hear, and crossing my fingers you somehow dodged a bullet...

Click to expand...

Usually the spring or pivot wears out before the bearings fail. But this scenario is not that uncommon.

Oil has sparkles. Think I smoked this one boys

Damn that sucks man. Definitely an eventful night it seems.

Changed oil and filter. Belt and tensioner. Running fine and good oil pressure for now. We will see how long it lasts.

I can’t find my filter cutter. I think that will be more telling. Seems that I couldn’t get much of the sparkles on my fingers.. almost looked as if a lot of what I was seeing was tiny bubbles. I got a new filter cutter on the way just because I’m curious.

Is the oil pressure gauge in a 95 a dummy gauge or actual psig?

Run it...why look for things you don't want to know?

Phooker said:

Run it...why look for things you don't want to know?

Click to expand...

You ain’t wrong. It’s gonna be ran regardless.

Drove it 5 miles around town. Seems like it drives like it always has. I laid under it to listen for noise, but it’s a 12v. It’s always sounded like it was full of marbles.

bateman said:

Drove it 5 miles around town. Seems like it drives like it always has. I laid under it to listen for noise, but it’s a 12v. It’s always sounded like it was full of marbles.

Click to expand...

Usually after I do dumb stuff like that, I put some fuel additive in to spoil it, tell the truck I'm sorry and keep going.

Lmao Worth a shot I guess.

Did it ever boil over even once?

If not you ain't hurt that 12v a bit. Could have made it home in 2hrs and it would still be fine. These old motors are tough.

Rad cap did its job as far as I know. Never heard anything while under the hood. I popped it after every one mile stretch. Overflow tank level is right where it was before hand.

I’m starting to think I didn’t know what I was looking at when I eyeballed the oil. I remember one other time I looked that close and thought there was some kind of particles in it.

I've thought the same about seeing sparkles in my oil too, but then again I'm always looking for excuses to worry about stuff on the truck. :bang Or it could be this state too :homo:

IIRC, back in the early days an engine was cooled by temperature differentials drawing water through the radiator.
Hot air/water rises, as it did, the radiator cooled it.

Think it's a model A or T Ford that has that form of a cooling system.

On my first VE engine, bought it from a yard, missing the dipstick, never checked the oil.
Fired it up and was coming back with water for the radiator, engine was hammering.
Shut it down, went to try to start it and barely turned.
In the 15 minutes it took me to go get oil and a filter, it cooled and broke loose.
Dumped 3 gallons of Rottie in it, swapped filter and never heard another noise from it in 50k before I sold it.

They are very tough to kill.

Mark.

Marq92, man I’m glad you’ve noticed the same. I was feelin like a tard haha. I’m guessing all the soot in the oil gives it that look, idk.

Mark, that’s wild. These old engines got their reputation for a reason I guess. I’m going to try to not get too excited until I’ve got some miles on this thing.

About to head across the river to a friends shop to do some boat work. It’s a solid 50+ miles there and back. Not that it’s going to tell me much. I’m just ready to get a good drive in. Anyone know about that oil gauge question? Mine stays a fuzz below 40 to just above 40psi. Been that way for nearly 100,000 miles. Just always seemed low to me.

I'd worry more about a blown HG than a bearing issue. I'm sure its fine.