Hi all
OK, I accept some of you will roll your eyes at my naivety but I have a horrible feeling that I've done something nasty to my MD2030D (B34/2001). It quite likely there were symptoms that I should have spotted but didn't. Like many on here I've been reading about, I suddenly had the temp warning go off today. It was after a short period (5-10 mins) of 3/4 throttle. I'd already slowed down to tick-over as I was approaching the lock to our marina and was quite surprised to hear it. Fortunately, we were 20m away from a different marina's pontoon so was able to quickly tie up and get the engine off. I let it cool for 15mins and carefully took off the filler cap. No water visible. It had been losing a little recently, perhaps a cupful a month, but I've just replaced the impeller pump seal as it had been weeping so thought it was fixed. In doing this, I'd taken out the tubes from the exchanger. Refilling took a lot of water and I wondered if I'd not resealed the tubes properly (my thinking being that I could be losing coolant into the exhaust). Eventually, it maintained the water level in the header so I went to try starting. We only had 3 mins of tick-over motoring to get back to our berth so I reckoned that leaving the filler cap off and someone ready with a bottle of water to top up, we'd get back. However, after pre-heating, I pressed the button but the starter was barely able to turn the engine over a couple of times. Normally, it starts straight away easy as pie with no smoke so something major was wrong. The only thing I can think of has to be a head gasket or cracked block and, thanks to my liberal use of the water bottle, a cylinder or two full of water. Great.
As an aside, I can't fault my marina, Sutton Harbour. At two minutes notice, they sent out the dory to get me through the lock and back into my berth. Very kind and helpful indeed. Great bunch of guys.
OK, now for the questions to any of you with engine experience -
1. does this sound like a head gasket, or, Heaven forbid, a cracked block?
2. if it's a cracked block, is it repairable or must it be replaced (can you even get recon Volvo blocks?)
3. does this sound like a water-flooded cylinder and if so, what is the likelihood of internal damage when trying to start (bearing in mind it only turned over once or twice before being turned off)?
4. is there an easy way for me to find out if there's water in a cylinder? I've got spanners and sockets, etc. but not much working knowledge of fixing marine diesels. Could I take out the injectors, stick in a bit of string and see if it comes out wet?
All thoughts are welcomed. I'm in Plymouth - anybody recommend any engine guys round here? There's always Marine Engineering (Volvo) but I'd rather not if I can avoid it...
Thanks in advance...