I presume by “won’t start” you mean the starter motor cranks the engine ok, but it doesn’t catch and run. Another idea in the fuel category, somehow it is getting flooded. Next time it happens try stepping on the accelerator pedal all the way to the floor when cranking the engine. If that makes it start good chance something is causing too much fuel inside the cylinders. I had a semi-similar problem with my (gasoline engine in my case) early 70’s classic Ford truck. This was caused by the carburetor leaking gasoline into the intake manifold after the engine had been running then shut off. The leak was through a defective power valve in the carb.
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Thanks for your email George , The starter cranked the engine ok , But the problem was one of the fuel filters leaking air . Also i tried stepping on the accelerator pedal all the the way to the floor and that made no difference at all .Trevor North Queensland .
Glad you got it solved there Trevor. You’d think if the fuel filter leaked air it would also leak fuel so you’d notice a fuel leak where you park. But apparently not. From the posts we get here Fuel system problems seem to be a pretty common cause of engine problems in diesel engine vehicles. It’s a pretty tough design problem if you think about it, having to somehow inject the fuel into the cylinder after the air has already been compressed 20:1 or more. The injection pumps in particular seem to be common failure items.
You live in Australia? Cool. Good day mate! I’m currently reading (well, more like listening to) a Clive Cussler book that takes place in Sydney and now the action has shifted on to Alice Springs.
No i did not see any diesel on the floor in the garage where i parked . Thanks George .
keep an eye on it. Not sure on your Ford, but some diesels have a check valve that keeps fuel from flowing back into the tank out of the filters. I have seen these go bad and essentially run the vehicle out of fuel over night.
and a leak big enough to suck air but still small enough to not leak fuel is a common occurrence.
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Trevor 4 July Drove yesterday with no problems because i kept the engine running all the time at the dump , but today i started it up in my garage and it stalled again after running for a short period of time it except it turns over ok . No fuel leaks on the garage floor .
Trevor 4 July 1705 hours The problem continues i pumped up the black button on the top of the main filter and put my foot flat to the floor and what do u know it started up ,I ran it for about 5minutes at about 2500 revs and it continued to run until i switched it off . I will leave it now to try tomorrow .