last week my 89 hatchy overheated and i noticed (on a hot day) that white smoke (not alot) was coming out of the tailpipe. so i parked the hatchy and had it towed home. today i go to start her up and i noticed that coolant is leaking from the muffler..

i checked the oil and it is clear as day, so im not sure if the head gasket is actually blown.. is there another way i can find out if the head gasket is blown?

 

The oil is clear of coolant or it's clear?

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by DenzComp &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">The oil is clear of coolant or it's clear?</TD></TR></TABLE>
im gonna go with clear of coolant since nothing in a motor is even close to clear.
do a comp. test

 

if theres moisture coming out of the tailpipe its normal. how do you know for sure that its coolant? the first thing i would do is check the cooland resivour, and if its extremely low then you might have a head gasket problem. then i would loosen the drain plug a little and if the first couple of drop are coolant then you have a bad head gasket. did you check under the oil cap for moisture buildup?

 

same thing happend to my rex... sounds like a blown head gasket.... a cumbustion leak test will give u deffinite answer good luck!

 

the oil is clear not cloudy/milky as would suggest that the head gasket is blown..(i was told this is one way to tell if the HG is blown)

i know for a fact that its coolant, its green.. and there is a small puddle of it under my muffler and its leaking..

 

there is no moisture buildup under the oil cap..

i might be just starting to go, because once i noticed the white smoke i pulled over and turn the car off. then had it towed..

 

not true you can blow ur head gasket and its gonna lead out of ur exhaust if it doesnt go to the oil.... causing the chocolate milk affect... well thats what i call it

 

when u drained the oil, was there bubbles on top. and if u pour it out u can tell if there's water or coolant on top.

 

how do you get that much coolant to your muffler? youd think it would burn up before it got there, exspecially if it just started to happen. usually youd have so much white smoke that it would fill the street. does the liquid smell sweet? or do you know what coolant smells like? pictures would help.

 

ofcourse i know what coolant looks and smells like.. what's leaking out of my muffler is 'green coolant'.. there was a small puddle but it absorbed into the ground already.

there is smoke but not alot.. like i said, as soon as it started smoking a little bit, i shut the car off.. if i let the car run and run, im sure the smoke will get MUCH worse. but im not trying to damage the engine..

i think its escaping through the tale pipe because when ihad it towed it was hanging off of the tow truck with the front end up on the tow truck..

its definately coolant.. at this point i dont want to even bother with head gaskets.. the car has 150k+ miles on it, so i think its time to drop a new engine in there..

 

that amount of coolant should burn up and smoke alot , not come out your tail pipe. since your car was overheated then i would assume the exhaust would be plenty hot enough to burn it up plus it should burn in the combustion chamber. but i could be wrong.

 

did you look in your coolant resivour or radiator to see if you were low? it may turn green cus of the exhaust gasses and other crap in your tailpipe. i dont think that much coolant would pour out the exhaust unless you have no headgasket at all or your egt's were under 260 degrees