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Black smoke......

Posted: February 25th, 2011, 9:43 pm
by 323guy
i have a 2010 navara from massy and i notice that when i pull off hard i am getting a little puff of black smoke coming from the exhaust.

mind you, the van is only doing about 3500kilos.

is this normal or should i be concerned?
what should i do?

Re: Black smoke......

Posted: February 25th, 2011, 9:50 pm
by speedaholic
das normal with the quality of diesel we get here in trinidad... but be awake of the gas stations that u fill up at... the common rail fuel injection system in your navara is very sensitive to bad fuel... and cud run into costly repairs.. to try your best to fill up at reputable gas stations.. eg. unipets etc... but i dont think that puff of smoke shud be a problem... the other navara owners on the forum will confirm... congrats on ur new purchase...

Re: Black smoke......

Posted: February 25th, 2011, 10:59 pm
by civic minded
its your van bussin a fart - dont worry about it

Re: Black smoke......

Posted: February 25th, 2011, 11:13 pm
by speedaholic
^^ hahahah! or that...

Re: Black smoke......

Posted: February 26th, 2011, 8:02 am
by Jeremy Mohd
LH had this problem and I think he did an ECU reset.
Johnnyblue had smoking as part of some other problems, and he had to replace the turbo.

Both guys have new navs..

What you should do, is carry it into the firm let them know. And keep carrying it back until they fix it. New van should not be throwing any kind visible black smoke, except the first tumble when it starts in the morning.

Re: Black smoke......

Posted: February 26th, 2011, 8:11 am
by lighthammer
speedaholic wrote:das normal with the quality of diesel we get here in trinidad... but be awake of the gas stations that u fill up at... the common rail fuel injection system in your navara is very sensitive to bad fuel... and cud run into costly repairs.. to try your best to fill up at reputable gas stations.. eg. unipets etc... but i dont think that puff of smoke shud be a problem... the other navara owners on the forum will confirm... congrats on ur new purchase...



Yeah I was getting black smoke out of my Navara as well, even though it's relatively new - I now reach 10,0015KM this morning :).


My smoking occured mostly under hard acceleration, but it also occasionally occurs when pulling off - esp. after a long idle. This is because of buildup of exhaust within the exhaust pipes, it gets blown out the tailpipe as you pull off and rev into 1st and 2nd. By 3rd gear it's usually gone, and then all the way from 4th to 6th gear there's no smoke at all.


I've done extensive research on it - looked up www.nissan-navara.net and www.navara.asia and read all the forum posts on smoking - and I narrowed it down to our crappy diesel fuel quality.

- It's not the injectors, because the truck is still new and even so, if the injectors were dirty there'd be power loss.
- It's not the air filter, because I put in a K&N and the same thing was happening, and I put back in the stock filter and no change in behaviour
- I think my driving habits did contribute a little to the smoking. I was driving the Navara hard for the first couple of weeks, and I believe the aggressive driving occurred during the "learning phase" of the van's ECU - so it learnt that I have a heavy foot and thus should always give me a rich mixture of fuel for more power. However that would have lead to more smoking since there are less hydrocarbons being burnt on normal/moderate driving.


I was able to reduce the smoking a bit by resetting the ECU and then driving easy for a bit to teach the ECU to give me a more leaner fuel supply.

Reset your ECU after you do an oil-change or major service, or after you change your Air Filter/Drop in a K&N.

- with the van engine WARM, switch off (if you have a turbo timer, let it count down and switch off the van)
- then turn the ignition to "ON" so all the dash lights come on
- wait 3 seconds
- pump accelerator 5 time, do this within 5 seconds
- take foot off accelerator, count to 7 seconds
- then press and hold the Accelerator all the way down for 10 seconds

the yellow "check engine" light will start to flash - this means your truck is now in Diagnostic Mode and will give you specific codes for any errors in the system.

10 slow flashes, then 30 fast flashes means there's no errors.

Now hold the accelerator down for 15-20 seconds.
This will put the ECU into "Learning Mode" - it will now be learning your driving habits as you start, then drive, then shut off later on.



The yellow light will continue to flash anyway, so take off your foot from the accelerator and start up.

Then go for a nice, easy drive, go through all the gears 1-5 or 1-6 if you're manual, and then find a place to stop and switch off.
Then start back up - and drive normal. Your ECU now learnt to give you a nice, lean mixture of fuel and you should see less smoking, and prob a better overall fuel economy.



***NOTE***

Neal and Massy does not do this ECU reset for you after changing your oil when you service by them - so be sure to do the ECU reset after each oil change when you get home.

Re: Black smoke......

Posted: February 26th, 2011, 10:41 pm
by sliderz1
^^^^^^^realise dis wuz also happenin 2 my cuz NAV , firm said it wuz poor diesel.........imma try dis

good info!!!!!!!!!

Re: Black smoke......

Posted: February 27th, 2011, 10:25 pm
by PTME
can this code work on the Hilux?

Re: Black smoke......

Posted: February 27th, 2011, 10:36 pm
by speedaholic
^^ i rell dont think so inno! try a google search and see what comes up... i dont think the hilux used and E throttle like the navs...

Re: Black smoke......

Posted: February 27th, 2011, 11:45 pm
by MrCuddles
not evn sure if d Frontiers we hv com wit ECUs, but if dey do hw do u go about resettin it??

Re: Black smoke......

Posted: February 28th, 2011, 5:47 am
by lighthammer
The code is for the Navara - I don't think it works for the other trucks.

The newer trucks - Hilux D4-D, Ranger TDCI, L200 Sportero - they all have ECU's.
The BT50 and older ranger with the WLT engines, Frontier, B2500, K34/K74 L200 and older Hilux/Hilux surf (1kZ engines) all have mechanical fuel control. So the reset won't really work - you'd just have to get the injectors serviced and the fuel pump recalibrated mechanically.


I dunno what's the reset codes for the other trucks but there's another way to reboot the entire computer system:

- disconnect the battery terminals (both pos and neg)
- tumble the engine to get most of the residual charge out
- pump the brake pedal 3-5 times to get more of the residual charge out
- if you have a volt-meter, check the system charge across the pos and neg battery leads - should read about 0.1V or something
- If there's charge left, or if you don't have a voltmeter, then touch the pos and neg terminals of the car together (don't worry, it won't harm the electrics - you already discharged most of the current by tripping the starter motor and brake pump).

Then reconnect the terminals and restart - then again take a nice easy drive, go through all the gears 1-5 or 1-6, switch off (let the turbo timer run out) and then start back up and drive normal.

This is a hard-reboot, while the other technique for the Navara is a soft reboot.
The hard-reboot will reset most of the soft-memory or RAM in the truck's electronics - including your tripmeter, clock, stereo presets as well as your ECU's learned fuel maps from your driving styles.

Re: Black smoke......

Posted: March 1st, 2011, 12:51 am
by Rutless Tiida
The easy way to do a reset is disconnect the battery and give the van a wash and vacuum (it should take about an hour). Then reconnect the battery and you good.