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Jim Weatherford Member
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I think some may remember the severe whitish smoking that JH 13046 is doing. I’ve had it to two referred mechanics and nobody can tell me anything about what’[s causing it or how to fix it. My next thought is maybe I have a head gasket problem despite good tests. I’m gonna get a oil sample in the morning after church and send it off to a lab for analysis. That should be able to tell me if I have water in the oil or antifreeze or… Dose anyone know where I’m gonna send the sample? What bothers me is that #13046 runs well despite the smoking, the smoke has no identifiable odor, doesn’t feel oily and no smell of any kind yet the smoke is like a military style smoke generator. I don’t mind having the heads rebuilt or whatever it takes, however I don’t want to spend the money and be right back where I am now. |
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Ricardo Member 
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There are only four things that your engine ( Lotus in a Jensen Healey) could burn and smoke like that. 1- oil; the smoke would be bluish and your oil level would drop eventually; your spark plugs will have an oily residue at the electrodes and there will be an oily film at your exhaust pipe. Oil could come from valve guides or piston rings that are worn out, the engine breather if it's connected anywhere in the intake system, a clogged air intake 2- water: the smoke would be very white, there would probably be bubbles in the coolant in your radiator, your coolant level would drop. Water would come from bad head gaskets, cracked or warped heads or block or cracked or perforated liners 3- Gasoline-you need to burn this in orther for your car to move. kidding aside, if you are burning too much gasoline in your engine, the spark plugs will have a faint smell of gasoline, you'll make a smoke that's whitish/gray and if you have an oil sample inspected, you'll find gas in the oil; in very severe cases of very rich situation, the plugs will foul, will not fire and you are able to smell the fuel in the oil and in the plugs without any difficulty. Too much gas is usually asociated with rich setting of the carburator jets, leaky bowls, too much pump pressure, dirty or otherwise clogged air cleaner, throttles not in sinc., etc. 4- Brake fluid- if the rear seal in your brake master cylinder is deffective or otherwise leaking and the front seal of the vacuum booster is not up to par, the vacuum diaphragm inside the brake booster will send the brake fluid thru the vacuum hose to the intake manifold and into the combustion chamber of the engine to be mix with the gas/fuel mixture and burned; you'll see a wetness behind the master cylinder in the firewall, the inside of the vacuum hose will be moist and the level of the brake fluid will drop inside the master cylinder reservoir Hope this will help you some what with your dilema Ricardo |
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Jim Weatherford Member
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Ricardo; Your time, information and reply is much appreciated. I have a lot to do. I'm going to go over to the shop and pull an oil sample and go from there. Again, many thanks. |
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Mark Rosenbaum Member 
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Since you detect no odor, I'd suspect first coolant, then brake fluid via the path Ricardo mentions, with oil at the bottom of the list assuming the crankcase is not overfilled. I'd also add a couple of notes to his comments: For (1) - if an engine has bad intake valve guides there is usually a pronounced puff of oil smoke from the exhaust pipes, immediately upon startup. If the smoke is definitely oil and it takes a few seconds to begin, suspect the oil control rings. For (2) - coolant is also present within the intake manifold so check the joint between the manifold and head. Depending on the brand and percentage of antifreeze in the coolant, the characteristic sweetish odor is usually but not always detectable. Finally, just as weird possibilities, you might check: (A) Is the hose from your windshield washer accidentally hooked up to one of the vacuum ports on the carbs or intake manifold? (B) If you have a vacuum-controlled water valve in your heater hose line, is the valve perhaps defective and allowing coolant to be sucked into the engine? |
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Jim Weatherford Member
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Thanks all for your thoughts and comments. I was able to make an observation last Sunday. I started Black Beauty up and she ran smooth as silk drove around the block... "no smoke! When she warmed up, the smoke became quite thick and ugly, when I applied throtle the smoke deminished. I went back over tonight and she did exactly the same thing when she get hot she smokes, before the temp get up, smooth running and no smoke! Oil levels were normal. Any ideas on this? I also got oil sample and waiting for the kit, but I'm sure it will come back clean and in normal condition the oil was very clean and almost clear (synthetic), no discoloration, no metal, no goo, nothing. |
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Brett Gibson JH5 20497 Member
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Jim, you dont say if your loosing oil or anti freeze, but lets say your oil is OK and coolant is the culprit because the smoke is white, logic say's you have to be burning something, Ric came up with alot of very good things for you to check, so now we also hear temp's an issue so throw expansion and contraction into the mix, one of the first things to get hot when you start up is the head but on the other score what ever has coolant in it will heat up slower around the coolant contact area's, bear with me Jim I'm talking to myself as I'm typing this, so it seems to point in the direction of head intake manifold issues, the easiest thing to check first would be a compression check, if that looks good then the head gasket is OK, then I would do a pressure check of the cooling system to see if that holds it pressure, I'm thinking this is were you will run into trouble and if you do one of the first things I'd look at would be the inlet manifold gasket, after that then I would lean towards a crack in either the manifold or head ............... Hope my ramblins help .................. Brett |
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Mark Rosenbaum Member
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It sounds like a fluid (probably coolant) is getting into the cylinders only if the cooling system is under pressure and there's a high vacuum in the intake manifold. A quick check would be to remove the radiator cap from a cold engine, start the engine and let it warm up, and see if smoke occurs. If there is no smoke, or far less smoke, then the problem may be a bad intake manifold gasket, internally leaking manifold casting, or internally leaking cylinder head. If the radiator cap is then reinstalled and a few minutes later you again have smoke, it's pretty likely that the basic cause has been identified. If you're really unlucky, you might have some sort of coolant leak between cylinder head and coolant jacket, or between block and cylinder liner, but in either case I'd expect to see combustion gases in the coolant. To test for this, modern diagnostic auto shops add some chemical to the coolant that reacts with combustion gases. It's a pretty conclusive test, and the cost should be only about $100 or so -- about the same as a JH head gasket. Last edited on 04-22-2005 11:36 pm by Mark Rosenbaum |
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Jim Weatherford Member
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Thanks again, I see I have my work cut out. My compression is 125 X4 across all cylendars and the leak down was normal again as I was told. I am not loosing oil or coolant. So... I'll follow the threads and do some testing. Thanks again. |
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Jim Weatherford Member
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I changed to synthetic motor oil, I was incorrect before and running nonsynthetic oil. I changed the oil and now I have no or very little shoke, of course synthetic doesn't smoke, so I have not solved the problem despite extensive testing as advised. The car continues running very well and I do drive it for short periods of time and always keeping an eye on the oil and coolent levels and I don't push it hard at all. Until I have a job, I'm not going to be doing anything right now. I am taking Black Beauty to the "Red, White & Blue" annual car show this Sunday at the Orange County Worship Center in Santa Ana. Show starts at 3:PM Hope to see some of you there. Attachment: JH View_1_320.jpg (Downloaded 94 times) |
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Paul Koehler Member 
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Jim, Could you have a slow/small leak of oil from the exhaust cam cover, dripping oil onto the header? When the engine temp gets hot enough, the oil that has leaked onto and down the header pipe (it doesn't stop when the car is turned off), will start to burn off, and might even enter cockpit via the shift lever opening. It might be worth a 30 second look, just to exclude the possibility. PK -18849 |
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Brett Gibson JH5 20497 Member
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Jim, on my way to the 2005 Nationals in Philly this past week my car started to smoke after driving about two hours, and the further I went the worse it got, killed alot of mosquitos though, turned out as the engine got hotter and hotter ( no over heating ) the rubber cam cover gasket near the header started to sqeeze out allowing oil to drip onto the header, just had to let it cool off and loosen up the cover and push it back into place, any chance you might have this problem ??? Brett. |
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Jim Weatherford Member
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Guys, Thanks again for all the thoughts and ideas, I have some checking to do and I'll let you all know. Again, many thanks. Jim |
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