Smoking Exhaust Advice
Discussion
Did a coolant flush a few days ago and a massive white smoke cloud came from the exhaust while I was bleeding the system, lasted about 30 seconds. Been driving around since and absolutely no smoke now, no overheating at idle or driving, no puddles under the car. Oil looks fine, no milky colour. Filled coolant to 'full' line when the engine was cold and have noticed it has slightly dropped, unsure if this is just due to air being bleeding while I drove it. Prior to the flush, absolutely no white smoke coming from tail pipe and coolant was full, only changed because it was due. Completely at a loss, any ideas?
PhilBiscuit said:
Gotta start somewhere, boss
Of course. For now, unless you have any big trips planned, I’d be leaving it and seeing how it goes. It can sometimes take a few journeys for all air to find its way out. Just keep an eye on levels and the temperature gauge.
If the coolant level continues to drop after a dozen or so journeys of twenty miles+, then I’d be concerned and would be looking for other symptoms of head gasket failure.
Tony1963 said:
Of course.
For now, unless you have any big trips planned, I’d be leaving it and seeing how it goes. It can sometimes take a few journeys for all air to find its way out. Just keep an eye on levels and the temperature gauge.
If the coolant level continues to drop after a dozen or so journeys of twenty miles+, then I’d be concerned and would be looking for other symptoms of head gasket failure.
Thanks for the advice! I'll keep an eye on it then. Seriously hoping it's just air but we'll see. Have ordered an exhaust gas test kit to test for a BHG so will give that a go when it arrives also.For now, unless you have any big trips planned, I’d be leaving it and seeing how it goes. It can sometimes take a few journeys for all air to find its way out. Just keep an eye on levels and the temperature gauge.
If the coolant level continues to drop after a dozen or so journeys of twenty miles+, then I’d be concerned and would be looking for other symptoms of head gasket failure.
PhilBiscuit said:
Exactly that; drained old coolant
That can be problematic on some cars due to the risk of introducing an air lock which can be hard to shift. On some cars it can be common to have a liter or so of air trapped in the system which will gradually make its way out over the next few dozens / hundreds / thousands of miles.It doesn't sound like this would have any chance of introducing water into the exhaust but perhaps it was left out in the rain in just the right circumstances for water to get into the exhaust, or something like that. It would onlt need a tiny amount of water to produce the water vapour you saw. Evenj just running the engine cold for a few minutes cam accumulate a surprising amount of water in the exhaust, and you probably did that a few times during this process.
Unless you keep losing large amounts of coolant or keep seeing large amounts of steam from the exhaust outside of a cold start, I wouldn't worry about it.
A friend has just done the same thing after his buick was parked up for a few weeks. He did the flush and then had s
t loads of oil fumes coming out of the exhaust and dripping from one of the joints. He has a breather tank mounted above the engine and the oil was draining into the inlet manifold. the thing is, the car was fine before, the pcv valve is clean and we still don't know how oil got into the expansion tank while the car was parked for a few weeks. It's fine now he's cleaned it and ran it for a while. Weird.
t loads of oil fumes coming out of the exhaust and dripping from one of the joints. He has a breather tank mounted above the engine and the oil was draining into the inlet manifold. the thing is, the car was fine before, the pcv valve is clean and we still don't know how oil got into the expansion tank while the car was parked for a few weeks. It's fine now he's cleaned it and ran it for a while. Weird.In the morning traffic, it's common to see cars that appear to be incontinent! Their exhausts dump large amounts of liquid water onto the road, I presume as the water vapour in the exhaust gases condenses in the cold exhaust pipes and silencers.
For those exhaust gases to turn to steam and then condense as the cloud of droplets described by the OP, the water must hit hot metal. Can't recall without looking back if this was the OP's situation of if he was starting from cold. If he was, then the water must have been leaked into the engine and been evaporated by the combustion process.
John
For those exhaust gases to turn to steam and then condense as the cloud of droplets described by the OP, the water must hit hot metal. Can't recall without looking back if this was the OP's situation of if he was starting from cold. If he was, then the water must have been leaked into the engine and been evaporated by the combustion process.
John
Thanks for the replies everyone. I've just topped off the coolant and I'll keep an eye on it. No smoke since the initial cloud still so just hoping it's nothing to worry about. Have ordered a borescope to inspect each cylinder's condition so I'll have a look for any signs of coolant burning while I'm at it. Other than that, I'll just monitor it. If anything major happens, I'll report back! Thanks again guys
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