Here's an issue that just cropped up today with my NEW Listeroid project.
When I first got the unit, I noticed that it had blown some very oily soot out of one of the exhaust mufflers. After I got it running and the pumps balanced, the problem more or less went away. The oil level was just barely touching the dipstick. I removed the back crankcase cover to check things out (in order to verify the crankshaft throws while I was going through the balancing process) and I discovered that the oil "splash paddles" were turned 90 degrees from where they should be (in other words, sort of "knife edge" to the direction of rotation). I turned them 90 degrees to achieve maximum "splash". I added a couple of quarts or so to bring it up to the second mark on the stick - which I assumed was the "full" mark. After putting the cover on, I fired it up and noticed that the cylinder that had the oily muffler earlier began to smoke (white smoke). It rapidly got worse and began to "run away". I shut off the fuel and it was still trying to run. I decompressed it and it stopped. Soooo, it looks like the oil level is too high (dipstick obviously miss-marked) and/or too much "splash" going on. It is trying to run on the lube oil getting by the rings --- blowing some oil droplets out of that one muffler. When the oil level was lower and the "splash paddles" were turned in a "knife edge" direction, there was no problem - (well -- just a teeny trace of light smoke from the one cylinder).
So my thoughts are that I have too much oil in the crankcase, at the moment, and also maybe too much splash (or both). the one cylinder that smokes slightly may have to "break in" some more (remember, this is a new unit ---- I doubt if it has more than a couple of hours or so on it).
I plan on reducing the oil level back to where it was and turning the "splash paddles back to their original position and checking it out again. Meanwhile --- any suggestions??