Hi All,

Bought a 2000 DII a couple of weeks ago with 160k Kilometers. Had a few oil leaks, Rocker gaskets mainly by the look of things, and was slowly leaking coolant from the front LHS of the block - so figured on a head gasket needing to be done. No steam in exhaust, so thought that the leak was from the water jackets to the outside of the block.

Driving around a little over the last week it there has started being a bit of white smoke coming out of the exhaust, and a bit of what looks like oil being blown through ending up on the concrete and my hand if I put it behind the exhaust pipe. Inside of pipe is dark black, like it might be running rich, and strong smell of exhaust. Car is running fine, maybe a slight rough idle.

Car is laid up and I'm going to do the head gaskets in the next week or two - hoping that the oil might be the head gasket, but anything else I should look out for? PCV valve? Had a look through the forums and nothing else has jumped out.

Cheers

Marty

 

White smoke is gas, running rich. Oil would be blue smoke. The black on the tailpipe, ground, hand, is soot mixed with condensed water coming out if the exhaust (normal, within reason. Does not mean there's a bad head gasket. Water naturally condense inside the exhaust).

Do you have any engine codes? Bad O2 sensor maybe? Could very well be the cause of your running rich. So could an exhaust leak before the O2 sensor.

 

Nope. White smoke is coolant burning off in the combustion process. You could have a bad head gasket or a cracked cylinder bore.

 

Oh ****, you're right. Black/grey smoke is running rich.

 

The oil light being on is an indication of low level or low oil pressure. Not related to HG failure. Most likely failed oil pump georotor, but there are a few other active threads on that topic right now.

 

Ok thanks for the replies.

So then from the sounds of things could be that the head gasket has now blown through to the cylinder, rather that just to the outside of the block, and coolant is in the exhaust. I guess this could also be causing issues with the 02 sensors and end up running a bit rich? The exhaust colour is white but does have a little blue/grey in it, and the 'oil' type residue.

No low oil light showing, but will check the fluids to see if any of them are down. Just got a scanner in the mail so will hook it up and see what codes I'm getting.

Cheers

 

Co2 test the coolant tank

 

Actually white steam not smoke may be indicative of coolant entering a combustion chamber. White or grey smoke is usually an indication of a lubricant burning. An overly rich fuel mixture may produce black smoke.

You can easily determine the difference between steam and smoke by allowing the exhaust to blow into a pint glass to check for condensation.
......

 

Ok thanks all. I'll do the pint glass test, and if that doesn't show obvious coolant will exhaust test the coolant. It is leaking out to the outside of the head gasket anyway so that needs to be done either way, but would be good to know if this issue isn'tto do with coolant in the exhaust before I pull it apart.