[Ted655]

Some oil will run down the valve stems and colledt on the pistons. When you start up that little amount gets burned. As the valve guides wear it becoms more noticeable.

[jeff germano]

Well my motor is a 79. I replaced the left heads gasket. because it was leaking oil where it met the intake manifold but i do believe the gasket was quite brittle. Iregret not doing the other side. Do you think thats what it is. Some times i have water come out of my tail pipes not much but a little. also after a few hundred miles my coolant is down about 2 inches or so. is that normal. i cant say i burn oil because the little smoke i have is just white also because my crankshaft seal leaks a little so the dipstick isnt accurate. I did not lose any noticable power. Please help thank you

[bullheimer]

as was stated white smoke is water, not the kind steaming when the condensation inside the exhaust heats up in the morning and blows out, but after it's all warmed up: blown gasket somewhere like a head gasket. that will cause your water to go down, power should go down=compression check, also can use a carbon analizer to check for it in your radiator water if you find a shop with one sometimes it can turn your water oily or grey. a pressure check on the radiator may indicate that too but maybe not, i have a leak in my heater core a pressure check can't detect. good luck

[Ted655]

Jeff..If you suspect H-gasket problems, I'm going to reccomend buying (or borrowing) a cylinder leakage tester.$65.00, but worth it. It can tell you things about your valve-cylinder-heads that no compression guage can. Basicly (i hate it when my kid uses that word), you put compressed air into each cyl., then run around and look/listen for air leaks. Air coming from the tail pipe, valve covers, manifold, radiator, crankcase. <img src="graemlins/mwink.gif" border="0" alt="[mwink]" />

[72 chevy]

Someone told me a while back how to make a "home made" leakdown tester, cant remember. Any ideas or articles people?

[Ted655]

Mine is just a chunk of steel, with a guage, a compression hose, a valve with a air hose fitting. You screw it in like a comp guage. hook an air line up. turn the valve on. charge the cylinder with air, turn the valve off and watch for leakdown. If there is any, you open the valve and run around listening for the hissss. If you use a regular compression hose, remove the check valve that is in some of them. Bubbles in the radiator are the coolest, followed by the air coming out of the dipstick. YES! It WAS a tired tired engine. But it feels better now!

[cncmaster]

Well the carb is a stock remanufactured Q-jet 4-bbl Rodchester. The car is a 80 Trans Am. Witch came with a 305. I replaced the block with a 350 with all the origonial 305 equment. It runs rich. You can smell the fuel. I might of confused, condinsation for the white smoke. It only happens when I first warm it up in the morring. It seems to idel ok, not shakey or any thing. And the only trouble code I get is ( No reference pulses to the ECM ). What that all means I'm not sure. Help me out guys.


THX...