Well just as the topic says I have white smoke on start up. Compression is good anywhere from 90 to 105 and that was tested on a cold engine. The smoke will go away after a couple minutes and not return till the car has sat overnight. I have a hard time believing that it is an early signal of a blown head gasket because the compression numbers are good. It has been humid here recently and is this just condensation? I hope so because I am suppose to go to a DE event with the car this weekend. Need you opions is it condensation or something eles?

 

where do you live? is there moisture building in the exhaust at all? what compression #'s do you have? checked your oil and coolent already?
~Eyal
EDIT: dammit, you edited after i post!

 

Sorry I hit enter and the topic was posted before i was done.

The coolant looks normal and the oil looks normal to.

It did die on me once but it was sitting outside and in the rain. It has been in the garage since and just get white smoke on start up and goes away in a couple minutes.

I did find a lose vacuum line on the thermostatic valve in coolant circulation. There is two lines going into the valve one goes to the throttle body and the other goes to a control valve. Which one goes on which port? Or does this have nothing to do with the smoke?

 

hmm, do you have a normal airbox? is there a way for water to be injested?
~Eyal

 

yes I have a normal airbox and i don't think water would be gettin in there but i will check to see if anything is wet.

 

Those compression numbers are not good, you should see at least 125psi cold and 140-150psi warm. (What are the units that your measurements were taken in?)

It could be headgasket, how do your spark plugs look? It's all clean under the oil fill cap?

 

Compression is often normal for many early-stage blown headgaskets.

Is the idle bad for a little while on cold start-up? That, and a very clean plug after a cold startup would clinch it.

 

There appears to be no mixing of fluids. It does idle rough for 45 secs to min and a half then goes away. Spark plugs are clean and under the oil cap is dirty. Well F*#K guess i am not going to the DE event this weekend. My first though were a head gasket but with even compression number i doubted it but you guys have reassured me that it most likely is.

 

Well your low compression could be because of other things (maybe even a faulty gauge?). I wouldn't jump to conclusions just yet.

All 4 of your spark plugs are clean relative to what they normally look like?

 

All 4 plugs are cleaner than what I remember them being. I pulled all 4 plugs and none smelled like antifreeze. The oil cap has a sludge that is yellow and gray and there is also moisture in the cap.

If it is the head gasket should I o ring. I have guru chips and Lindsey 3 inch exhaust. I don’t plan on any more performance upgrades for a while and would like to run 16-17psi safely without any problems. Would just a widefire head gasket be okay or do I need to o-ring. The local shop around here o-rings the block and it would cost 400 dollars to do. Is it worth it? The engine seems strong but it has 80-90k on it now. It gets used for some street driving and up to 3 DE events each year. Opinions will be appreciated.
Thanks
-Ryan

 

The main exhaust components from the combustion are water (steam) and CO2. Much smaller amounts of HC, CO and NOx are also there, but taken care of by the catalytic converter (if present). If the exhaust system is cold on startup the steam will condensate and become visible as white smoke. The more mass (heavier) there is in the exhaust system the longer the white smoke will persist.

Before pointing to the head gasket it would be valuable to know the following:
Has the white smoke become worse? If so, does it correlate to cold nights?
Are you loosing coolant?

The sludge in the oil cap could be of concern, but could also be explained by frequent short trips, where the engine has not gotten a chance to be fully hot.

Laust

 

Compression should be 140-150. White smoke at start up means blown head gasket, how is you water level? does it decrease? always low? doe sthe car run warmer than usual?

 

White smoke at startup is normal, especially when its raining, cold nights and when engine has not been used for a couple of days. The moisture in the oil cap as well.
I got the same problem as you after installing the lindsey 3" exhaust. Did a compression test and a leakdown test. Results very good . Compression test on all 4 where between 145 -150 : leakdown test all 4 below 1 %. your compression test surly indicates that something is wrong.
Do a leak down test and Tap the oil of the car and look for milkshake, if you are loosing coolant only in small amounts, I would also check the coolant reservoir cap.

 

Well, yes after the car has been sitting for a while, white smokes does come out. If if white smoke comes out on every start up, that's not normal (naturally)

 

Again this depends on the weather conditions and if you have an aftermarket exhaust w/o catalytic converter. The exhaust will condensate a bit before warm.

when car reaches operating temp the smoke goes away. Ofcourse if it`s a LOT of smoke , and then I mean a LOT, then you may have reason to be worried. Check the oil and coolant idle the engine with the oil cap off , there should not be a significant amount of oil/condense coming up here, as if the engine runs different when cap on/off!?
. Wipe off the moisture on the oil cap and drive for a while then check again. If you do this when engine is already hot, you should not get any grey/white moisture.
Best advice : go and do a leakdown test and check your oil.