mr_munro

Hey

my friend has a Del Sol b16a with 170,000 Km on it. Sometimes and only sometimes under hard acceleration he will cover the road in thick white smoke coming from the tail pipe.

Car does not overheat, drives and idles fine. If there was an issue with the head gasket - wouldnt it produce the white smoke all the time? He left my house just before, car was still warm and only a little but of white smoke came out upon startup and none came out when he drove off.

Any other possible causes for coolant mixing with the oil to burn through the exhaust?

Thanks.

Former User

The head gasket is probably blown. Is there coolant loss?

You can buy a test kit that detects exhaust gas in the coolant, which is diagnostic for a blown head gasket.

ek3turbo

ok you can check every morning the level of the coolant off course with the engine cold open the cap and if the radiator needs antifreeze if it does fill up then check back again in couple days see if its missing some more and when yu start the car andif you see the white smoke try to smell if it smell sweet is more probably yur head gasket good luck

khube2

he said its only under hard acceleration, so itd be hard to run behind the car trying to smell the emissions. We all know that white is an indication of coolant being burned off/evaporated so its definitely a coolant issue. Ron is right, buy the test kit. We use them at my job and its simple and accurate.

gzes

Go to autozone and get a conpressikn test tool and test it. Pretty easy to do and should help in diagnosting if you need gasket or not

mr_munro

Ok thanks all, we will try the kit. Is the test called a cooling system pressure tester?

mr_munro

We will need to check the car stone cold to check for any coolant loss

mr_munro

well turns out my friend had over filled his motor with oil by about 2 litres, car does not smoke anymore.

But i thought white smoke was coolant, how can oil burn white?

Astronaughty

If it's burning in the head it comes out white usually. My B16 was producing white smoke under acceleration around when VTEC engaged, but it looked to thick to be from the coolant. Turned out to be the valve seals.