[Phil Hill]

Phil, I think you're first instinct was the right one...........

Air leaks in the LP side of the fuel system, ie from the tank to the pump would bleed air into the system, the most likely places are the air-bleed port on the top of the fuel filter, the seal of the fuel filter element, or the priming bulb pump somewhere in a low pressure fuel line feeding the distribution pump.

Leaks on the high pressure side of the distribution pump will most likely result in the aformentioned fire......... assuming the fuel reaches something hot enough to ignite it, like the turbo !! It could be that the injectors themselves are leaking into the engine too, which would result in a very rich start up with plenty of smoke and ultimately a knackerd engine due to bore washing.

If the bores are washed out, and the crankcase is pressurising the breather system, the engine could "run away" by sucking up the sump oil and fuel vapours from the crankcase into the induction system via the breathers until it either rev's itself to destruction or melts due to lack of oil. Once this situation starts you can't shut the engine down until it fails........

This would be my prefered solution partly because it's so destructive and scary, but mostly because a rod through the block means it's unlikely ever to be resurected !!

As Joe said you can bleed up the system by cracking off the injectors and cranking until you spray everything including yourself in diesel..........

Also as Joe says the glow plugs are an electrical heater in each cylinder to aid that initial start-up. Check the fuse for the glow plugs, but my guess is they are buggered. They usually need to be changed when the mileage/operating hours on the engine are high, but no-one ever does because of cost and faff factor. This is why most industrial diesels like fork lifts require some burning newspaper down the intake..........

Hope you get rid of it soon, from experience of an early Vectra TD when they were new they are horrid to drive too............

Phil.

As a matter of interest modern "diesel" engines are closer in design to the Hornsby Ackroyd oil engine than the early designs of R. Diesel (monoblock direct injection vs pre-combustor, preheated chambers, medium/high vs low compression, ran on so-called "lamp oil" hence "oil engine" rather than vegetable oil or blown particulate fuels)............. By the time Diesel was experimenting (for MAN) Ruston and Hornsby had something like 600 engines in various applications all over the world........... including powering the light of the Empire State Building !!