as this being my first post i would like to say thanks for such a good forum. I did search for my issue and i found a few people with similar sounding issues but their solutions did not/will not remedy mine.

I recently bought a 91 F350 and am now trying to get it running, here is where i at.

motor has compression and turns over fine, I have replaced fuel pump w/ electric, fuel filter and oil. i have the fuel system bled all the way to the hard lines going into the injectors, i even hardwired the fuel cutoff n the top of the pump. The truck wont start and here is where it gets even weirder.... we tried giving it a little jump start with ether, I actually ended up feeding it a crap load of ether and it wouldnt even vapor lock the motor. I am getting a little bit of white smoke out of the exhaust and i could faintly smell the ether from the exhaust. Also while cranking it over i covered the intake with my hand as best i could and noticed it even blows back a little bit during its cycle. I heard that these motors use a full hydro roller valvetrain system. this motor has been sitting approx 1-1.5 yrs since it was last used and along with moisture buildup and what not being its enemy with starting right now, if the oil bled down from the lifters, can that cause it to not be opening the valves hence the blowback and refusal to vapor lock?

Please help, I am a very experienced mechanic so you dont have to dummy everything down for me, but I am a very inexperieced DIESEL mechanic. I get the concept but this is all chinese for me.

Thanks in advance!

EDIT: forgot to ask, if the valvetrain does function as described to me, is there a way to prime it without just turning the motor over? like on the HPOP's the powerstrokes use?

 

The lifters are no different than a gas engine lifter so cranking is the only way to pump them up. WD 40 is safer than ether for starting diesels. It might be time to do a compression test on it. You can get a compression tester from Harbour Freight tools for about $30.