Well went for a drive to the supermarket to get some bread and car was running fine. Got back in to come home and car had trouble starting. When it did start it had a really bad misfire. Felt like it was running on three cylinders. Could also smell petrol. Had a look under the bonnet but nothing visible......no smoke, no smell of fuel there. Tried to drive home but not enough power so now parked on side of road. While driving I noticed it was blowing a lot of white smoke, I'm guessing unburnt fuel. Car already has a series 2 PTU. Any suggestions?????
Check error codes. Likely plugs, check injector, coilpack and PTU plugs. The S2 PTU plugs have a habbit of pushing the pins through the plug. Pull it off and have a look.
Sounds like bad electrical connections(but there are SOOO many). 'White smoke' is definitely NOT unburnt fuel(that is Grey/Black). Blueish smoke is oil, White is generally coolant/water vapour.
Yeah, it sounds like you've instantly dropped 2 or 3 cylinders for it to all of a sudden run that bad. So i'm guessing it's less likely to be an individual coilpack or connector. Maybe as Chrispy said, wiring or connector to or from the PTU. Also have a good look over the CAS connector too. It can cause rough running if not sitting properly, but i would have thought that would moreso cause stalling...
And that's a good point of Chili's too. White is water. Hope you didn't blow a head gasket. (it would give similar symptoms to what you described and also give white steam out the exhaust )
thanks for the quick replies guys....... doesn't sound good......could it possibly be my third motor in 6 months
Have you checked your coolant level? Unlikely it would blow a head gasket just sitting there. Could also be a broken intake cam gear dowel, allowing one intake cam to be out of time a few degrees. This almost always happens at start up.
is it possible you could have overheated? If you're diagnostics/error code check/visual inspection & cleaning of said connectors doesn't give you cures, try opening the radiator cap (when engine is cold) and start car to look for bubbles out of your coolant. You could also try a compression test, this will tell you if you've blown a head gasket. *hopefully this is not the case!*
Get consult onto it - if you can't even connect to the car, then the ECU is stuffed. Heaps cheaper than a head gasket though.
Coolant is fine, has never run hot. I was just thinking, yesterday when I was driving home and pulled up at a traffic light I thought I caught site of "smoke" out the side of my eye. I discounted it as another car or dust (it was windy). The car was running ok at this stage. I had just come of the freeway, so I'd been do 80 to 100km for about 20 minutes. The first start this morning was much rougher than normal as well, but once it "cleared it throat" it seemed fine. Wasn't until I came out of the shop that it was really bad. I don't know much about head gaskets, but like you said Eric, I thought they were pretty tough. I'm still running this one in, so car has never been to red line and spends most of its time between 1-5k rpm. Still on stock boost and only let it build to 7psi probably three times so far. I've called a local mobile mechanic who Wizard recommended (he works on Z's regularly) to have a look. I'm not game to tempt fate so will leave it to the experts. It's parked in a residential street not far from home and he said he will be able to get to it in the next couple of days. I'll post up more once he has had a look.
consult can read the ecu without the car being started, i would be doing that and checking for error codes, if you don't have consult, use the paperclip method in the tech section.
I hope it's not, but it sounds head gasket to me. Loss of power, runs like a dog and white smoke..... Have you checked coolant colour and oil colour? Neither is 100% accurate (depends on how gasket is blown), but could give you indications. Oily water or milky oil = head gasket. Can't remember off hand if Zed's radiator cap is on top of radiator or elsewhere, but from cold, cap off - see if you get bubbles etc. in water. Take out plugs and inspect - there's pictures in tech section for "reading" the colour of the plug ends. Depending on issues, temp sender doesn't always tell you the truth. Trouble after parking isn't unusual. Car shuts off and heat surge from heat in engine and coolant raises pressure until the heat dissipates. That could have put it over the edge. Is it was a new / reco engine (or heads off lately), was head retension required after xxxxx km? Was it done? Good luck. Hope it's nothing big. Simon.
Thanks Simon. I'll check the oil and water later today and see if there are any hints there. The motor has been recondition and has done about 800km, but hasn't done any hard driving yet. As for your suspicion, I'm begin to think you might be right. Getting that bad feeling deep down, just hope there can be some other explanation as I just cant understand how it could be a head gasket under the nurtured conditions it lives in.
Depends a lot of the gaskets used, but many reco engines need a retension around 100-500km. Plus, not sure if this is the case or not, but read elsewhere about some head bolts are one tension use only, and can't be reused reliably. Never heard of that before, but it was on a ZX tech article about heads. Shutting it down quickly would hopefully save any trouble. All the best.
Take it back to the reconditioner before you do anything major to it yourself which could void any warranty claims.
I wish it was that easy Mark, its a long way from home. Well I checked the oil and water today and couldn't find any obvious mixing of the two. Coolant level was still on the reserver dip stick. I'm not game to start it to check for bubbles in case I make it worse. I'm picturing a cylinder slowly filling up with coolant and when I try to start the car I get hydrolock........is this a possibility or is my imagination too vivid??
Pull the plugs and have a look in with a torch. Although some water may leak thru the rings down into the sump... If its dry inside, there is a kit you can buy that uses a chemical indicator to look for combustion gas in the radiator coolant. It works like a PH indicator and can be a reliable fix.
