After searching and doing some coolant seal checks, I am still boggled. My 88 TII sends a lot of white smoke out the exhaust during startup. I have smelled it, and sometimes I think I get a slight whiff of coolant, but it is only once in a while and only for a couple seconds right after startup. My car will continue to smoke pretty bad until it warms up, then there is no smoke and it runs fine. Also during startup one of the spark plugs will not fire properly for about 5 seconds of reving, then it will run smooth. This situation was a lot worse before I replaced the spark plugs: It would run on one spark plug for a good 2 minutes. Today I pulled out all my new spark plugs to see what they look like, all of them were fine except for the front (towards the front of the car) leading spark plug which had some fluid on it, but I'm not sure what it was, but I'm sure that had to be the spark plug that isn't firing correctly right away.

Moving on to the issue of coolant seal, my engine is a rebuild with about 12,000 miles on it. I did have three occurences where my car overheated badly before I turned it off, one was a blown upper rad hose, another was a split in the plastic filler neck connection, and another when my heater core got badly clogged, which I have bypassed right now. So I did have some overheating occurences, but my car has no overheating problems right now, runs perfect temperature wise. But I am losing coolant, I have to put more in every two weeks or so or else my car will start to run hotter. I did the gyser test and absolutly no coolant spilled out, I also checked for bubbles coming out of the filler neck, and there was absolutly none. There is no coolant being injected into the overflow tank and there is no boiling in the overflow tank.

So, to summerize all of this:
1. Main problem - lots of white smoke on startup
2. Front leading spark plug has fluid on it and doesn't fire correctly for 5-10 seconds after startup
3. Rebuilt engine with 12,000 miles, encountered 3 occurences of overheating
4. Is losing coolant somehow, somewhere
5. Does not overheat at all right now
6. Does not fail gyser test
7. Does not have bubbles coming up out of thermostat
8. No coolant being injected into the overflow tank.

As a side note, there are a couple of othere problems which started around the same time as the smoking issue. One is that my fuel gauge is not fuctioning correctly, at around a half a tank it will just drop down to empty. The second problem is that when I hold my rpm's at a speed above 3,000, meaning so acceleration or deceleration, I can hear a weird clicking noise, which is worse in the lower gears.

Sorry for all of this information at one time, but this is the situation.

thank you for your help,
kevin

 

Well white smoke is burning coolant but to further more check, unscrew the oil filler neck cap, and see if there is white foamy crap in it. If there is it is for sure buring coolant.

 

sounds like burning coolant to me. my guess is you got a coolant seal that went chaput

 

where exactly is the coolant seal, is it in the front of the engine or the rear, and if this is the problem is there a way to replace the coolant seal without doing a total rebuild, considering my engine isn't even a year old, I can't believe the seal went out already.

 

same thignn happened to my current TII, blew a coolant seal, get it fixed before its too late, it cost me 4K bux to get a rebuilt engine put in

 

Do you also get white smoke at high (4K or more) RPM's when warm? If so probably seals.

 

No I don't. Once the engine is warmed up there is absolutely no smoke, it runs smooth, pulls hard and runs at the right temperature. If coolant seals are the problem, would I be able to replace it without a total rebuild? Can anyone tell me the coolant seal setup, is there more than one? Where is it/they located?

 

If it were a coolant leak it would smoke more when it has warmed up than when the engine is cold, since the coolant gets hot, then expands, and then more will be pushed threw the coolant seal that is leaking so I don't think you are burning coolant. I think that maybe your injectors are leaking and the fuel is washing the oil off the rotor housings, and then it is pooling at the bottom of the rotor housing. And when you start it, it is then burning what has pooled at the bottom of the housing off. So a question for you, does you car take a little bit longer to start than other people's cars that you have seen, and does it have any hot start problems???

 

Cory, you may be right with this because I have also been having a lot of flooding issues lately, since this smoking has started. I have a fuel pump switch so I am able to start it when it's warm, but it is really hard sometimes and takes a lot of cranking. I checked the oil filler neck for sudsy fluids like you mentioned earlier and there wasn't any; but I could have sworn that the filler neck smells a little like fuel, but I could be mistaken. Is this possible. Also, do you think my other problems may be related, ie. the clicking noise and the fuel gauge faliure.

thanks
kev

 

oh, and I got new injectors about three years ago, so they are fairly new, but I guess they could still be leaking.

 

Your oil will smell like fuel if you have flooded it very heavy or have flooded it alot. Mine smelled so bad before I had the injectors cleaned and put a fuel cut switch in that I swear I could drain the oil and then put it back in the fuel tank and it would run off of it.

If all else fails I would have the injectors tested to make sure that they aren't leaking, and I don't think that any of the fuel gauge failure and the clicking noise are conected, that just sounds like a short circuit somewere. Also it might be possible that if you bought injectors that are to big, that they could be putting out more fuel than your engine can burn. But they would have to be leaking to cause it to smoke on start up.

 

well, they are 550 cc's, so they aren't too big, but who knows. I went out and started my car today, and almost no smoke. It varies from day to day, and today it was a little warmer outside than it has been lately, so maybe the warmth helped somehow. Anyway, thanks for your help. I am relieved by the way to get an opinion against coolant seal faliure. Makes me feel better, but I still have a problem either way.

thanks,
kev

 

THIS is exactly what im experiencing. I know my engine flooded about a week or so ago so I did an oil change last night and it smelled really bad like gas. after I did the oil change, car started and ran phenomenally. it even did the advanced warm up thing where it revs to 3k (which it stopped since I flooded it before) now today I went to start it and it smoked for a couple minutes but stopped as soon as it warmed up. the smoke was white and had the odor of coolant. so is it injectors? go figure this al started as soon as I put the car for sale -_-

 

You are in denial. The coolant seals are gone, coolant just can't magically disappear. It is either on the ground or it is burning.

Oil burning-blueish smoke
Coolant burning-white smoke
Fuel-black smoke

 

Sounds like a coolant seal is toast. The smoke happens on start up because as the engine sits the housing with the failed seal will build up a puddle of coolant inside and it won't fire til the coolants been burned/pushed out hence the mis at start.

It doesn't take much over heating to deteriorate the seals and you've got three overheats under your belt. The cooling system is the number one thing you absolutely much keep up maintenance if you want a long lasting rotary.

 

lots of misinformation in this thread, mainly by cory. the coolant seals are toast, likely an iron if the engine is less than a year old. i would suggest finding out if the shop that rebuilt it offers any sort of warranty, it should have lasted longer than a year...

 

If you flood the car bad enough it will be white. I've had this happen plenty of times with my first rx7 and never had a coolant issue.

 

I smell dust..Who farted a 10 year old thread?