Leakage and smoke from under Bonnet

[illuzian]

Hey guys,

Any idea what would cause a leak that evaporates but also would of causes a small plume of smoke from the right hand side of the engine. Smelt like oil but a leak that evaporates makes me think its coolant.

Cheers.

Ant

 

[dimi_108]

That sounds like coolant. Lift the bonnet and check underneath if there are any splashes of coolant on the underneath of the bonnet.
It may also be your coolant overflow tank bubbling from loss of pressure in the cooling system, so be sure to check your top and bottom radiator hose for small cuts, chaffing or pin holes.

Let us know how you go

 

[bradc]

Coolant overflow bottle would be the first thing I would check. Can you smell the antifreeze at all? It tends to have a slightly sweet/sickly smell to it.

 

[illuzian]

It had a burning oil smell, had the car down at my local mechanic and they said they couldn't find anything except a slow leak from my rocker cover gasket. We are guessing it could of dropped onto the exhaust or the turbos.. could this be about right?

The coolant overflow bottle seemed fine when I pulled over, definitely smelled like burning oil(at least to my untrained cigarette damaged nose)

 

[Guest]

When you say right hand side, do you mean the driver's side? I get this smell & sometimes a little whiff of smoke after I do an oil change, and think it's to do with a leaking oil seal around the rear centre plug. I noticed there was oil in there when I changed the plugs, but haven't got around to replacing the seals yet. I have them here, just trying to find the time. The other thing I did was to change the o-rings on the dipstick which seemed to help a bit.

 

[illuzian]

Yeah is exactly what you descibe, small whiff on the drivers side, maybe I should check it out.

 

[Guest]

When was your last oil change, and was it a flush or just a simple drain & fill?

Have a look at my whinges over at Club VR-4:

http://www.clubvr4.com/forum/showthread.php?t=38962

http://www.clubvr4.com/forum/showthread.php?t=39125

For the dipstick... you can buy a pack of a hundred or so assorted o-rings from Bunnings for only a couple of dollars, however they aren't supposed to be oil/fuel resistant but I haven't had any trouble and they been in a couple of months. If I see them degrading I'll just replace them. Alternatively you can go to a bearing shop and get better quality o-rings.

 

[SiliconAngel]

When my clutch died I got the engine pretty hot (could only engage at around 4-5k RPM) and it caused the coolant to overheat, which of course forced it out the overflow tank at high pressure. It made a mess and there was quite a bit of steam / smoke from the RHS of the bonnet and when I took a look under there I could see what looked like a sticky residue, initially leading me to think something serious had blown, but I quickly realised it was the glycerol in the coolant. Cleaned the engine bay down once everything was fixed and haven't had a temp issue since. Hopefully that's all your prob is too