Crunky

I noticed my exhaust smelled pretty rich a couple months ago, and I was having real poor gas mileage too. I started by changing my o2 sensor, and it didn't seem to help. I have beem observing my fuel mileage around town over the past 4 tanks and the best I managed was around 19-20 MPG, the other 3 tanks I got between 15-17 MPG, and I am only able to go around 280 miles on a full tank.

Just recently, I started to notice some puffs of gray smoke. The first few times it would puff I was going from second gear to thrid, and also from third to fourth, also only happened if I would give it more gas than usual. But it would only happen if these 2 conditions were present at the same time. (If that makes sense)
I also noticed that my exhuast still stinks real bad, I can't describe the smell; and my exhaust tip is now covered in black silt. Now it seems to randomly puff out the gray smoke, now it does it just idling in the driveway when cold in the morning. But it really blows out if I get on the throttle.
Any ideas?

Techno Duck

Have you changed the DME temp sensor? A faulty sensor will cause your car to constantly run rich, as the DME will think the car is still warming up. Black sooty exhaust means your running rich. Smell the exhaust, does it smell rich, do your eyes start to tear? Blueish grey or blueish white smoke is usually burnt oil.

Crunky

Actually, I just went ot and popped the hood, looked underneath the throttle body, and it look like the TPS is soaked in oil. I spose the smoke could actually be blue, or a combination of gray and blue. But it looks gray to me, I'll try and get it to smoke agoin in the driveway so I can pay more attention to it.
It also appears that atleast one of the fuel lines running to the rail is leaking. THe intake manifold underneath the line had a small bluish colored puddle on it, and the underneath side of the line looks wet too. The wierd thing is that it doesn't smell like gas for some reason.
Anways, how do I inspect the air oil separator? And how hard is it to replace the fuel lines? I tried to see where they start and it looks like its a pretty long combonation of hard/rubber line. This is an early N/A by the way.

Techno Duck

Does your car have the fuel lines that run over the intake manifold? I am not sure what options you have to replace those. Changing the ones that run over the exhaust are easy, i did it this past weekend.

Theres no real way to inspect the o-rings on the air oil seperator. If yours are anything like mine, the o-rings were so old that i had a pretty serious oil leak dripping off that side of the pan. They are a pain to change, you need to take the intake off.

Crunky

Yah, the early cars have the lines that come from theo other side of the motor, not over the exhaust. From under the car it looks like they go from a metal line turns into a rubber line, and then one of them goes back to metal before the FPR. The other one is similar, but it remains rubber all the way to the damper. Or I got them mixed up but thats how the line goes. Maybe I can cut out the rubber piece and put some bulk rubber F/I line in its place and clamp it on each side where it slips onto the hard line.

As for the OAS, is it in the trottle body or the intake manifold its self? Would it be possible to just replace the throttle body?
I also tried sticking my nose infront of the tailpipe to smell it, and got hit in the face with some moisture. I collected some on my hand and it has no distinctive smell. The car was cold when I checked the exhaust smell too.

Techno Duck

Moisture is normal when the car is cold.

The air oil sepeator is actually the same thing as the oil fill tube. Its all one piece actually.

Crunky

Doh, guess I'll have to wait till I have time to rebuild the AOS, and in the mean time I'll crawl under the car and see what I can do about the fuel lines.
Thanks for help Techno