I just finished up dropping a replacement motor into a 1998 Accord 2.3. I bought the car with a blown head gasket (coolant in #2 and #3 cylinders)and it had been run out of oil, so I just pulled and junked the motor. I dropped in a replacement 1999 motor from a salvage yard with 75k on it, guaranteed to be good with a 30-day warranty.

I hooked up just enough to get it to fire, and it sounded great. I finished hooking everything up, backed it out of the garage and it smokes like a son of a gun. The majority of smoke is out the tailpipe, but some billows out from the rear pass. wheelwell area.

I've pulled all but 1 plug (someone dropped a washer down in where the plug is and I need to somehow get it out before I can get a socket in), and they look great.

Assuming the motor I bought is good, what are the odds that the catalytic coverter and mufflers are just water-logged with coolant, and it is just burning off? Its a real nice cloud, which hasn't seemed to decrease in the 60 seconds I've run the motor, but it also doesn't have a super-sweet smell like I'd assume cooking antifreeze would.

your thoughts??

 

run it longer... remember the grease u used, or anything else that could have got into the engine such as carburator cleaner can make a nasty cloud of smoke...

 

yeah i would run it longer and like a few minutes and see if it dies down a little bit. a cloud of white smoke isnt the worst thing..........now if it were a cloud of blue smoke i would be worried that there is something wrong with the motor.

 

i second that... there shouldn't be anything wrong... please keep us posted....

 

I let it run for probably 10 minutes, and the cloud did not subside in the least. I pulled the plugs and bumped the starter to move the pistons so I could inspect the top of them; #1 and #2 were bone dry. #3 and #4 were both extremely wet. Compression test on all 4 cylinders was 170# give or take a needle's width on my gauge. Again, the plugs look excellent. ?????

 

how about the injectors????

 

Guess I'm not sure why injectors would cause white smoke like that. Injectors from motor to motor were the same. If something happened and it was running excessively rich, I'd have black smoke. Lean and I'd have no smoke. After seeing 2 wet piston tops, I have to assume I've got a bum head gasket.

 

i meant the injectors could not be working properly and u may be getting a lean mix on cyls 1 & 2... then heats up and the gsket gets (censored)... oil into cyls and then... white smoke...

 

Gotcha....

I seriously doubt a fuel system issue is the cause here. Oil in the chamber would make blue smoke, not white smoke, and this is white smoke, a LOT of white smoke, like "your car is on fire man!" amounts of white smoke. Sweet, coolant smelling plumes of white smoke that never seem to end.

 

there you go... coolant-smelling... take out the head and check the gasket... it could be leaking coolant and remember its corrosive...