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Saturday night I drove my new 1981 diesel 4 speed 4WD short bed LUV truck home to St. Louis from a nearby suburb in Illinois. With the exception of a brief whiff of rubber and the aroma of antifreeze, the truck drove great despite having about 123k miles. The steering, brakes, and suspension seem solid and the diesel engine runs like a sewing machine when it's warmed up.

It's cold here right now, and I am planning to try to start up tomorrow afternoon in the heat of the day to go get a state inspection. The battery is wimpy so I have a trickle charger on it tonight. As it only starts on two cylinders I think I only have two glow plugs so I also have the block heater plugged in. A friend will teach me how to change them and will also show me how to adjust my valves. I can also see I have an exhaust leak near the manifold as quite a bit of exhaust billows out from under the hood when I try to start it.

As for the rubber and antifreeze, I may have found at least one possible source as today I discovered an antifreeze leak directly beneath the radiator and the lower radiator hose. I live in the City and park on the street, so tomorrow before I try to start up I'll lie down and see if I can spot the actual leak. I am also concerned that the head gasket may be leaking as I could see some antifreeze behind the head.

I welcome any advice or comments as I start to work with this truck. It's going to be my daily driver so I can semi-retire my W123 Mercedes. As with my Mercedes, I will be running this truck on the biodiesel I make at home. On a Mercedes, you have to change out the rubber fuel lines in the engine compartment when you run on biodiesel and that's about it.

Does anybody know if there are any rubber components in the fuel pump or any other part of the fuel system? Is anyone driving their diesel LUV with B100?

Thanks!

Maud



Maud