Just made a new discovery. Dried coolant is crusted underneath the driver side fuel rail.

 

Any tips for cracking open the filter? I would like to open mine up after the next oil change to see what it looks like.

 

Combustion gasses consist mostly of carbon dioxide and water vapor, and contain small amounts of unburned fuel and other contaminants. Water and fuel vapors in the crankcase can react to rapidly break down and shorten the life of engine oil and contribute to the formation of sludge in the crankcase.

Ever notice the steam or water dripping out of your tail pipe when your vehicle is warming up. Some of that water vapor along with unburned fuel slip by your piston rings (blow-by) and are carried down into the crankcase with the oil being sprayed on the cylinder walls.

Every time the vehicle is driven a short period of time, it adds more and more water and unburned fuel to the oil. That's why if you do allot of short trips you should get your truck up on the highway for 15-20 minutes once or twice a week to get the oil hot long enough to evaporate the water and unburned fuel.

Just getting the engine hot doesn't get the water out, it has to be held at that temp with the engine running at a decent speed for a while to allow the water to vaporize out of the oil and then be carried out by the PCV system.





FOG

 

Guys, thanks for all the suggestions so far. I replaced the valve cover gaskets and put everything back together. The issue is that it's running rough and it's smoking (white) near the passenger exhaust manifold. Pic is below. Any ideas of what's going on?


ETA: pic doesn't show smoke but it's from that area.

 

Yeah, I understand that water is a by product of combustion and it gets into the oil. I could even work out the stoichiometric equation if I needed to. What I don't understand is exactly what chemical reaction is taking place between the water and oil to cause the sludge. Does it speed up the oxidation or something?

 

I use a dremel tool with a cut off blade or a die grinder with a cut off blade. Some people use a hack saw. There are some large pipe cutters that work too. Just cut it around the base where the threads are.

 

White smoke is a sign of burning coolant, does it smell sweet? Maybe related to the dried coolant you saw earlier?

 

Good thought.

It has continued to smoke near the rear of the exhaust manifold on BOTH sides of the engine.

Sweet? I wouldn't say so.

 

When water is present in an oil for an extended period of time it will emulsify the oil and form a mixture which is much more corrosive than the two components alone which then forms the infamous sludge.

This is the same reason that A/C systems have a desiccant drier in the system to remove moisture. The moisture will mix with the refrigerant oil and form a corrosive acid and sludge that destroys the A/C system from the inside.

But in short it oxides the the oil which causes its PH to drop resulting in the oil becoming acidic which reacts with the other additives in the oil and forms sludge.


FOG

 

Thanks for the explanation FOG, makes sense now. You are a true asset to YT.

Kev...did you replace the PCV valve? Maybe some old grud in the PCV line is now getting dumped into the intake causing your smoke.

 

Yep, sure did. I'm going to run it again and monitor the smoking to see if it stops.

 

white smoke is head gasket failure. Is there white smoke coming out the exhaust too, or just in the engine compartment?

 

No white smoke from exhaust. Oil looked clean (free of coolant) when I drained it.

I still have some smoking near the exhaust manifold. It's also idling high, and running rough through the RPMs. No CEL, though.