Massey Ferguson 65 won't run

[Slooby]

My brother-in-law decided to go and run the tractor back and forth in his garden with the disc harrow attached this morning, made the first pass and the engine conked out.

I've then had the deep joy of trying to get it running again, another device that my dad and he expect to use without maintaining...

Anyway logically the issue has to be fuel related and I have tried bleeding everything (filter, pump and injectors) multiple times...occasionally getting a tune for a few minutes only for it to die again and repeat...

There's fuel in the tank, there doesn't appear to any water coming from the drop out, the filter looks OK inside and not swimming in anything nasty.

The only thing I can find that is confusing me is the fuel tap under the tank that then feeds the clear bowl ahead of the mechanical feed pump...I wound out plastic tap and over did it a bit as it came right out...with no sudden gush of fuel...ahah I thought, my mistake may have found the fault! Suspecting that the pick up in the tank was blocked by something Iput tge tap back in and then blew back up the feed...bit of bubbling coming from the tank, but it was hard work without a pump or compressor in a field...fuel is still barely flowing with tge tap removed and now even bleeding is doing nothing...

It's spending the night in the field

Anyone have any thoughts on what could be up?

[mechman]

Could the the tank cap be causing a vacuum?
Norm.

[Slooby]

I don't think so, it's pretty loose fitting at the best of times, but I'll try running without it to see

[hair bear]

Easiest thing I think would be to get a bucket, remove the filler cap, then remove the complete tap assembly from the tank. You'll catch some, and wear the rest but it will a, give the bottom of the tank a good flush b, give you access to the pencil filter in the tank, and c, allow closer inspection of the possibly damaged tap. Did this on our major, nothing came out of the tank. The crud had formed a perfect seal around the pencil filter. 'Course, didn't know that 'till I ventured a screwdriver into the tap hole. Proved my watch was diesel proof though.

[essexpete]

Definitely need to remove tap.

[Slooby]

Okie doke

Have an electric pump so can at least try it make this a slightly less getting covered in diesel operation...still reak of it from yesterday's games

[Slooby]

Drained the fuel (about 60 litres!), removed the tank and removed the fuel tap.

No sign of the pencil filter, a load of rust, paint, straw and dirt clogging up the tap.

Swirled the last of fuel in the tank around and emptied it into a stainless chafing dish (we have a few from the business that the family ran until Covid killed it off). Found the pencil filter in the debris.

Cleaned it all up, put it all back together, bled the injection pump and injectors, started on bleeding the injector on cylinder 1 on the second go round. Now running and starting fine again. So both Rob and Pete were spot on

[Jeremy Rowland]

Tim, try running it on a small separate gravity fed fuel tank, see what happens then, if it runs okay on that then it's either s duff lift pump or a clogged fuel line.

Jeremy

[Slooby]

It seems to be happy now that I've cleaned out the tap, removed all the debris from the tank and refitted the filter.

When I get the chance I'll give it a full service and take a look at the clutch adjustment because it is a bit out of whack on the take up point on both stages

[hair bear]

Now go roll that field!