Engine Diagnosis (lots of white smoke)

[peter carroll]

I have a '73 2.0 parts car that has terminal rust. I started the engine and it blows a ton of white smoke out of the exhaust. Lots of backfires also. Quarter inch of gas in the air cleaner and also gas in the oil. Thinking about using the engine for a project and was curious if anyone could pinpoint what the problem is. Rings? Burned valves? thanks, Pete

[norustscott]

Is it still FI?...sounds like wacked out fuel delivery....

[hardflex]

I'll take a stab and see if i can help..

I view smoke this way. Blueish smoke is oil burning, white smoke is water, and black smoke is too much fuel. If you have gas in the oil, it would be thin and could more readily leak past the valve guides or rings possibly causing the smoke you're seeing.

There is no way for fuel to get into the air cleaner unless someone hooked up a hose wrong. If you're talking about gasoline down past the butterfly inside the plenum, then the only way (assuming correct hose hookup) would be a leaky cold start injector. That injector or any other that was leaking could fill the heads with gasoline when the in engine was shut off.

I think you'll have to do some further analysis to know if the engine is good or not.

[peter carroll]

Thanks, the engine has since had the fuel inj. removed, so there is little I can do with it at the moment. I know the single carbs dont work well on the 914, however it might be an easy way to test to see if the problem was the fuel injection. Pete

[peter carroll]

Scott, the fuel inj. was still on when I was having these problems. Let me know if you still want to get together sometime to check out my Devin. I guess we are about a half hour from each other. Pete Carroll