Hi

One question regarding BHG. When you smoke white; does it smoke like that all the time or is it possible that smoke reduces when engine gets warmer?

many thanks

 

When my HG blew it never smoked while driving on the road. Only at start up for a bit. Keep checking your oil and topping up your rad, once your oil turns to a chocolate milk shake park it and do the gaskets.

 

Huh, I see. Well, oil looks fine and coolant is clear. The thing is that I do lose coolant but I do have tiny crack at the top of the radiator. At this point can't tell for sure is only this responsible for leak, or there is another place where it leaks or possible HG.

To what amount did you have coolant leak?

 

At start-up, it's very normal to have some white smoke as the water that accumulates in the exhaust system turns to stream and burns off. Once the engine is up to temp, the smoke should be gone.

If you have smoke at temp, does is smell sweet? Coolant, at least here in the States, has a sweet smell when it burns.

How fast are you losing coolant? How much coolant are you adding and how often? Maybe fix/replace the radiator and go from there.

 

During last 4 months or so I add around 1L of coolant; When I spotted that level was lowered, add some and so on...

Can't tell for sure. Smells like regular burn

 

Fix the radiator and see what happens to the coolant usage.

 

Fix the radiator and see.

I started by loosing a litre of coolant every 2months. Then went to about 5L a day lol

 

Hello, I have a 94 Toyota with the infamous 3.0 and i had similar problems. Mine was a blown Head Gasket, I put some stop leak in it and my engine blew up the next day. it burned a hole in the #1 Piston and had to be bored out 20 thousandths to get yhe Cylinder Wall smooth again. I would do a Leak test to c if u have a blown Head Gasket.

 

Many thanks guys. I spotted small leak at water pump. I think that can explain coolant loss. Let's see how that one will drain my pockets!
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

 

+ radiator
You will surely lose coolant through crack in the radiator. I did not see liquid leaking out of my radiator (XTerra, totaled), but I saw evidence/residue of steam, so my mech replaced it under warranty.

Yep another one. Pick the low-hanging fruits first. Both would probably cost you less than HG replacement. Merry Christmas and happy NY, to you too. And best of luck with that.

After I test drove my Runner before purchase I also saw white smoke as I followed PO to a shop, so I mentioned my HG concern to him same as yours above. He lowered asking price a bit, and also had radiator replaced cause I saw a crack on it.

 

Smell the exhaust, if it smells sweet it's burning coolant.
If you have a blown gasket DON'T keep driving as it will cause engine damage.

 

Is it coming out the weep hole? Not sure what engine/year you have, but the water pump isn't that much.

http://engnbldr.com/build-a-kit-85-95.html

 

So, new pump installed, coolant level is not changing. So far.

Another question; is it normal that while the engine is running bubbles come out in the coolant reservoir?

 

Have you replaced the radiator? If it's still leaking you'll get air in the system. But you also said your coolant level isn't going down so that doesn't make sense. The way I see out your system can't build up pressure if the radiator is cracked and it wouldn't be able to push water past the cap to put anything (coolant or bubbles) in the resevoir.

 

Well, few months ago I used that epoxy set and so far it's holding on. The other thing is that I have installed (don't know how do you call it in US and how much do you use it) is LPG, Liquid Petrol Gas. There was also small leak on two hoses there. Fix that one too. We'll see now....

The bubbles thing... did some reading and I see it's not good However, those I spot were so tiny (not like boiling) and after checking it few more times there was none. I think I'm just paranoid about HG, timing and so on