The Black Death

black smoke is too much fuel. you may have a bad injector and its leaking into the cylinder. then when you start it next ;boom it blows it all out.

white or blue smoke is and oil leak. you may have bad rings or gouged cylinder walls letting oil thru.

a good test to do is a cylinder compression test. you can rent it at most parts stores.

another quick temporary fix is engine restore. it goes in the oil and it restores some lost compression.

 

That's not a good thing either way lol. white smoke is usually antifreeze going into the engine, cracked heads or head gasket. Not sure what black is. Blue is definetly oil leaking into engine. Does it only do it when you start it first time in the morning? Could be valve seals. That sucks man. Not good.

 

idc what people say about that restore but it works!

 

your right white is water. maybe its got a cracked head gasket.

what color is your oil? if it looks like chocolate milk then you have water getting in your oil.

 

Well he said black smoke, was just going through the colors lol. I think black is too lean or too rich gas to air mixture like you said. Maybe it's just a bad mass air flow sensor

 

hows your gas milage?

 

could be timing. you may want to have the timing check. if the timing is back then you'll get like a black sort of smoke but not really noticable, if the timing is advance then you'll get a white sort of smoke.

Now if it smokes at an idle then that may be a different story. have a compression check like pedro said. you may also want to pull out a spark plug to see if their is any sort of oil on it. if their is then you have big problems.

 

i bet a cylinder is missing, pull all of your plugs out and if they look either really bad or discolored then get some new ones. does the power of the engine seem to come and go?

 

looks like oil is getting on your plugs. like G3 said... change the plugs and take note of what each plug looks like. oil on the plugs isn't a good sign though. change your oil immediately. that is very dark already.

 

anyone know anything about older cars... I have a 64.5 Mustang... with a 302, edelbrock intake with holley carb, c4 tranny, aluminum radiator with an electric fan, aluminum driveshaft, 9in rear end with posi-trac and traction bars, all wheel disc brakes. and it never overheats now... but I have an issue when it gets to normal operating tempature... when stopped at a red light I have to put it into neutral because it starts to idle really rough and turn off if I leave it in drive... the carb is adjusted fine and runs good for the first half hour of driving but then starts the rough idle. anyone have any advice? I tried a mustang forum but they arent good at getting back to topics. sorry 92civic for jacking your thread a little bit... but your oil is pretty dirty. that engine restore stuff is a good idea but I think the guys covered everything you should try.

 

jayz85, you should give throttletune a PM. he is good at helping out with those kind of problems. He'll answer you right away.

how is the idle when you are in neutral compared to being in drive? have you checked the tranny fluid?

 

okay I will pm him right now... the idle is fine in neutral... but when I switch back to drive it just stays up for about a minute and starts to want to turn off... offf tranny fluid... its full just got it flush and fresh fluid like a month ago and I check it everyday.

 

jay it sounds like your timing my be off a bit.

civic try this. buy some throttle cleaner and remove your plugs and spray it in the plug holes. then change the oil and add some restore in there.

check the PCV valve too. it should cost you around 30 or so for all that.

 

yea someone mentioned it mightve been my timing... im going to the napa down the street to buy some new vacuum plugs... and then probably try to make it to the hot rod shop in town... if not the local shop for the timing but since I wont be driving it for a week more than like 5 miles or so... it only gets like that after driving for awhile... I thought the timing was okay but can be kinda rough from time to time.

 

hmmmm check your plugs after it stalls out on you. that can tell you a lot too. maybe the carb needs a tune up?

 

I will pull a plug out tomorrow... i have no kinds of smoke though... yea the carb miiiight need to be rebuilt but it was just rebuilt a while ago. everything is pretty new on the car now.

 

how about a bad coil. maybe as it warms up its not putting out as much voltage when cold?

 

92 civic, does your car smell like gas at all. Black smoke= Too Rich, so we know you have a leak somewhere, for those acuras and civics. It is really common to get fuel injector seal leaks. It could be a seal leaking. Obviously change your plugs but also check those seals, they are like little "O" rings and if they look cracked or torn, they could be leaking into places they shouldn't be going.