Hey what's up? I know there have been many-a posts on these topic but I think mine might be somewhat independant.

1) Between 30-60 seconds of warming up.. my FD starts to belch out smoke.. the exhaust sounds rough and sitting in the car you can feel and the afterburn. It smokes for a few minutes and then it stops completely... the smoke isn't really thick at all. It doesn't have much of a distinguished smell to it either and its not incredibely hot, more on the warm side.

2) I think I might be burning coolant as well. Every time I shut off my car, the smell of burnt coolant fills the garage (with the hood up). Even when the car is running i can smell a slight hint of it with the hood up. The car doesn't overheat at all and it actually stays below the mid point on the temp gauge.

2a(another coolant question)If I attempt to fill up my overflow tank; it empties out all the coolant I give it within a few days. The only way it doesn't release coolant is when its completely empty (I think) Most obvious guess would be leak in overflow tank, but I don;t think thats the case. I'm using a 50/50 mix and I'm gonna get raped on tueday by a dealership unless I have a good insight on where to begin if I can do this myself (AND YES there water I probably need to purge yet I don;t think this would attribute to the problem.. but then again I'm asking the question so I could be wrong

3) my secondary turbo kicks in at around 5k and can't be felt unless the engine is under a fairly heavy load. I'm going to discredit this question by admitting that I don't have a boost gauge yet.. but I feel like I should be getting more go from the second turbo... sure I can feel some boost, but no real 'go' It seems the only time I feel boost from the second turbo is when I give it full throttle. I was wondering if this is similiar to others who run stock twins with stock boost or is it a problem with the my turbos. They only have 20k on them and 56k on the engine.

4) 0 oil pressure during idle is this normal?

I've searched for posts that relate to these problems but I haven't been able to find one that answers them exactly to my situation.
I thank you all for reading this post till the end, any response would be greatly apreciated thanks

 

2a: The coolant overflow tank is made up of 2 halves. If you attempt to fill the tank (which I once tried to do), you will notice a puddle around where the pass side oil cooler/underbelly tray is. It will never fill up. I believe it's pretty common for the connector to leak right there.

 

Excessive coolant loss is the beginnig tell-tale sign of coolant seal failure. Trust me, I know.

Does your car sometimes leave a puddle of coolant on the passenger side of the engine after you shut it off. This usually happens when you are gone. I tend to come back to my car and find this out.

Better plan on getting a rebuild...

 

Without a boost gauge, you are pissing in the dark. Just pick up a cheap boost gauge so you can see what's going on. You don't necessarily have to mount it yet, just run the line to the UIM and hold it in your hand so you can see what's going on....

Oil Pressure Sending Unit. It's located down below the oil filter. They usually get dirty and cleaning them can sometimes bring your readings back to normal. However, they also fail, but it's not an expensive part. Try cleaning it first.


As far the coolant problems, try this:

 

I started up my car this morning.. no smoke. I topped off the radiator filler neck, kept the cap off, when the car reached normal operating temp... all I could really see were sediments, I didn't see any real 'streams of bubbles' but I did see that there were certain times that there seemed the coolant had an oily residue in it, and there were certain spots it made in the coolant.. it was multi-colored.. I'm sorry I'm not sure how to really describe it. any suggestions? how much bubbling should I see? Also there is a lot of air in my cooling system. It gurgles for quite some time... my AST also sounds like its frying something... it sounds awkward. Maybe time for a new AST and radiator?? Any suggestions???

 

I've never done the bubbles test personally. From what I understand, if there are bubbles, you won't miss seeing them. If you didn't see any, you are probably ok.

As for the "burnt coolant" smell, you might check the coolant lines running into the Throttle Body. If the throttle body has been removed quite a few times, those lines tend to crack and cause leaks. However, those leaks usually only happen while the car is running. Typically it's not enough to hit the ground, but it just burns off on the hot engine parts (unless the cracks are large).

Start with the AST and replace the coolant lines running to/from it. That would be the most inexpensive way to start.

 

RE: Your coolant problems:
I had similar problems where I was running out of coolant and also getting the gurgling/boiling sound upon shut-down.
After numerous times of running the car and then getting under it I eventually traced the problem to very a minor leak from the bottom of the plastic end/side tanks on the POS OEM radiator. Upgraded to the Fluidyne and never had a cooling problem since.

Good Luck.
GEB.

 

thanks for all your replies, I'm gonna try a new radiator, thermostat and AST.. that should fix it

 

Swaped out the thermostat.. no gurgling no spewing coolant from overflow tank. if you've got similiar problems go with a new thermostat. All cooling problems fixed for now...