...BTW your Bieber avatar is awesome.-Malone
While the max power for a given amount of air is when there is smoke, provided the engine is adequately intercooled and the turbo is still reasonably efficient, increasing boost will clear the smoke while maintaining or even increasing power. All that said, at 18 psi and 1250°F pre-trubine (with a fast-acting probe like the micro-1000), I don't see any significant smoke unless I am running fairly high rpms, over 4,000. I wonder if your timing is still a bit retarded. You shouldn't be overly clattery but the DI engines are definitely more so than the IDI engines. If the timing is retarded, then the EGTs will be higher, there will be more smoke and power will be less. Let me know when you're coming through Flag and I'll put the diesel pulse adapter on it and set the timing to match your current injectors and give it a good listen. Short of that, you might use a smart phone dyno app and try advancing the timing and see if the max power improves. Provided it is not too clattery, I would set the timing near the peak power but err on the side of being retarded rather than overly advanced.