Thread: Common rail explained

Originally Posted by Davo

I've driven plenty of new cars for work, and my plan was to carry lots of food and water, and get a lift if something went wrong, because there wasn't much else I could do.

Good point, I carry all the tools and vital spares plus Nanocom (Td5 Scanner) in my own car, but never gave it a thought in my work car.

Once picking up a near new Telecom Mitsu L300 from its first service the oil light came on somewhere near Monengeeta , then dreaded bottom end rattle , Stopped to find no oil on the dip stick and found no sump plug, no mobile phones in those days. Walked to a farm and was lucky to get a helpful farmer who gave me some old sump oil and a selection of old spark plugs to jam in the sump plug hole. The engine was trashed but I got home.

Something like this could never happen with a modern CRD, well the oil plug could fall out and leave you stranded but you would be unable to keep driving and destroy the engine.

Originally Posted by Judo

^ The key word being "modern"? Being common rail has no relevance...

In one sense common rail is modern technology, then modern common rail is an example of tautology - there being no "old/ancient" common rail engines.

However there are new generation common rail, which are more advanced. and it could be argued the the latest generation is "modern".

For small diesel engines, common rail injection has proven to be necessary to meet emission regulations. Besides emission equipment, such as egr and particular filters, security measures are tied very closely with the ecu system, and adds to potential reliability issues.

For medium and large diesel engines, fuel consumption, as well as emissions have driven the change to common rail.