teletom

Hey all, I've been having trouble with my truck being hard to start in the morning. It starts rough and puts out some white smoke (smells like coolant) and then smooths out and runs great. However if I run it then park it to get some groceries or something, when I come back to start it seems like it need to crank for a longer time. The only evidence I have is the white smoke on the first startup and some white goo under my oil cap, otherwise oil and water are clean. So I decided to check the compression

Front
#1 -120
#2 -110
#3 -120
#4 -120

This seems pretty consistent but low to me, I didn't do a wet test but the engine was rebuilt not more that 50k ago. In addition I noticed that coolant had spray in my engine bay on the drivers side but I could never pinpoint the location of the leak.

Seeing as how average compression for this engine is supposed to be around 170 am I looking at a more serious problem or should I just replace the head gasket and see if that fixes it? Any help would be appreciated

-Zane

teletom

Any help appreciated!

slow-mo

When this scenario occurs again, first check the fuel level in the carburetor sight-glass. What is a common occurrence is that fuel in the float bowl will drain out into the intake manifold. This causes a hard start for two reasons. One is that now the fuel in the air/fuel ratio is very high, this causing a rich or flooded condition. Two, now there's no fuel in the float bowl as needed to run the engine.

Let us know.

teletom

I'm running a weber carb, I don't believe I have this sight glass. But would this be causing the white smoke and low compression?