Hi,

I was wondering, do most of you get a white smoke or maybe it's just water vapor in the mornings when you start your car? I'm getting that, and I'm wondering if that is normal. Is that just exhaust or water vapor? Is it bad? Is there a way to stop it? I'm glad you dont' have to smog for the first 5 years of ownership in CA, but I'm wondering if that's something I'm going to have to look out for in the future.

 

I get a lot of white smoke. But its mainly from my tires.

 

nothing to worry about. You will get a bit of white smoke on startup. I don't know all the techy terms but it has something to do with left over gases in the piston chambers after you turned off the car. Heck it could be something simple as water vapour in the exhaust system. All I know is unless tons of it is pouring out of the exhaust while you are driving you have nothing to worry about. Then again, right now in my area all cars do that because of the darn cold temperature

 

its theoil that leaks from the valves after they retract. the valves are made to shrink to prevent wear.

 

Sounds like condensation... like in cold morning start ups.

If you see bellowing white smoke when you start it up in the warm afternoon, that may be a problem.

 

Wouldn't that cause blue smoke

 

yes it would........it`s just condensation..

 

not nessisarily

 

I also have the white smoke, and it is definetly not condensation. It smells very sweet, and stinks up the garage for a minute or so. However, I know several people who have f-150s with modular V-8s, and all of them get the same problem. Two of them have more than 100,000 miles on their trucks, with no noticable oil consumption. I don't think it's a problem. I get the impression its just one of the little quirks of the Modular V-8s.

 

black smoke relates to fuel
blue smoke relates to oil
white smoke relates to water/condensation.
Fairly normal to see a little because of condensation.
If it is excessive you may then have a coolant leak into the engine etc/head gasket etc.

 

What are you doing with a running car in a garage for more than a minute anyway?
A sweet smelling white smoke screams coolant leak to me, but if they have 100K with no issues - how are they on coolant anyway? - maybe it something not to worry about.
Might want to mention it to your dealer.

 

I have seen relatively large amounts of white vapor in the morning. It isn't a water leak (head gasket) based on the smell, it seems to be fuel+water, i.e. condensation and whatever was squirted into the cylinders on shutdown.

This issue comes and goes, it isn't consistent, so I'm not worried about a possible problem.

I live on a slight upslope to my garage. So after babying it at 25mph down my street (long but slow residential area), I generally sit at idle in my driveway for several seconds while the garage door opens, then I need to gas it to let the clutch out and get into the garage up the shallow slope.

I generally shut the motor down quickly at that point. So it's often a blip of the throttle, some higher-than-idle speeds at shutdown. I think that is exacerbating the problem.

When I start up in the morning, if I don't see the vapor, I can still smell it. The car starts very rich, or at least is pumping out some unburned fuel left over from the prior shutdown.

I've seen this when the car has been off overnight, or over a week.

Again, I think it's water and fuel, and when there is greater condensation, we see the mix in the air. When there is less condensation, I still smell the fuel.

No biggy.

 

I'm not running the car in the garage - I open the door, start it, and back out.

I meant if someone else backs it out the smell lingers.