2520 cold start smoke/ blockheater install

[cast_and_blast]

My 2305 starts well here in MN throughout the seasons. It's kept under cover in an unheated garage and fires right up with no block heater all winter. I've started it down to -25F. Given, it sounds like a handful of bolts being shook in a metal coffee can for a few seconds when it's really, really cold.

My 2305 has no glow plug indicator, but you can hear a "click" when they are done heating. The gearshift needs to be in neutral (required to start anyway) and you don't turn the key the whole way to crank the engine. Some have advocated multiple iterations of heating the glowplugs. I've tried it - don't really notice a difference.

Good luck!

Scott

 

[Runner]

I was browsing the 2520 shop manual section on diagnosing problems with the intake air heater system. It goes through the steps to find out whether or not you are getting power to the intake air heater and at the end of the section, it says something to the effect "...if it is found that there is power to the intake air heater, but it is still not functioning, change the glow plugs...". This leads me to believe that there is one or more glow plugs mounted in the intake air heating unit.

So, my conclusion is that the 2520 has glow plugs after all, just not in the traditional location.

 

[Kamik]

Gosh, I'm gonna need more coffee this morning. Follow these steps to see the glowplug in the parts catalog:

open the link below,
open the sectional index
open 21- engine (marked TNV82A-BMJK)
open 10 - cylinder head, valves and rocker arms
#34 is the glow plug

Enjoy!


Hi Runner,

Great detective work! Here's a link to the breakdown in the parts catalog showing the glow plugs (sorry, I should have included it in the earlier post). Check out #34:

John Deere - Parts Catalog

Kamik

 

[Runner]

That picture is worth a thousand words.

Thanks, Kamik.

 

[Willl]

Evidently I was looking at the "MJKE" engine.

Weird that there would be a difference in engines under the same model #.

 

[jsboening]

When I had my 4100 it developed a hard starting problem. When it was any where near 40 degrees or lower it was about impossible to start. Being the original owner i knew somthing was wrong. I tried the turn the key when in gear trick and still had the same problem. We'll after buying a technical manual for it off of ebay I was able to determine it was the glow plug timer that was bad. What happened was the timer develop a short in it, if I squeezed it with my hand or a zip tie it work fine, but if left alone it wouldn't shut off. Because it wouldn't shut off it had fried all three glow plugs so there was no preheating at all. Thats why it was so hard to start, smoked like crazy, and ran ruff when it was cold. According to three dealerships it was a very rare problem. In fact nobody had the glow plugs in stock or could ever remember ordering them. In fact I can remember one parts guy arguing with me that 4100 didn't even have glow plugs. I told him I've got them in my hand and I'm pretty sure they are not spark plugs.

Any way sorry for rambling, but if you've got a volt/ohm meter you can check for voltage at the top of the glow plugs for the first few seconds after turning the key, before the glow plug timer turns off. Also I would pull them out and check the resistants from the top of the plug to the bottom to make sure the plugs themselves are working. Maybe you've got 1 or 2 not working. It just seems odd to me your have such a hard time starting it. I doubt it was engineered that way.