Smoke...smoke everywhere.

What weight oil did you use? I've found multi weight is too thin and can cause smoking out the tail pipe on a tired engine. I use straight 30W with good luck. Anything added to the oil will probably thin it out causing blowby and smoke out the exhaust.
 
I used 15/40, which seemed to be the general consensus across the internet. Can there be a big difference in how it runs with low compression on one or more cylinders? It seems to run and idle fine, though I admit I am curious as to what shape this engine is in. It doesn't miss a beat on the idle, just smokes. I do plan to change the oil again fairly soon, to drain out whatever can be drained. I may very well use straight 30.There seemed to be a little sludge, but mine was the consistency of bearing grease, with no gritty feeling. I shot a good bit of carb cleaner into the drain plug hole, and let it sit for a while to evaporate. At the very least I will pull the inspection plate on the next oil change. I have a roll of cork gasket material, and can make a new gasket.

Where I am at for the time being. I am about to have to put a rebuilt motor in my 98 Ford, so spending on this truck will have to take a break for a while.

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FordCustom said:
Please tell me this is a "sat a long time" problem, and it will slow down at some point? Smoke from the tailpipe, smoke from the crankcase oil filler breather, etc etc. Not huge clouds, but you know it was there for sure. Does this subside after it runs for a while?

There was also a little bit of valve train noise. Should you be able to hear this at all?

I drained and filled the pan with 15/40, and added some MMO for good measure. Filter is the stock canister style, and has a new cartridge in it.. Both thermostats popped open and worked fine.
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The 15/40 should be fine. MMO won't hurt anything but tends to smoke a little even in good known engines.
Take the car out and run it hard. Accelerate through the gears hard several times and pull a steep hill in second gear. Don't lug the engine.
Keep it humming. If the smoke doesn't subside, you may have major problems.

Remember, all machinery and electronic equipment runs on smoke.
If the smoke escapes you generally have something worn out or broken.
 
Hehe... out? The brake pedal is locked up, it has four rotten tires, no wipers, no signals, and worst of all, no seat.;)


There no steep hills here either, I hate to say.
 
FordCustom said:
Hehe... out? The brake pedal is locked up, it has four rotten tires, no wipers, no signals, and worst of all, no seat.;)


There no steep hills here either, I hate to say.
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Sounds like you might as well just junk it!! LOL, or let me haul it to WV where we have some steep hills.
 
I only paid $500 for the whole truck, which is the same price some people ask for a cab, or a set of rear fenders. No reason to junk it, not when I am already ahead of the game.;)
 
I'd do the compression check for sure then wait till you can run it on the road before any major engine tear down if the comp.cks.good. Nice buy!!!
 
I cranked it up just now, and let it idle again. NO smoke from the tailpipe, but there is still some from the breather. Not as much as before though. Could that be from it being overfilled? It has no more than 5 quarts, though the MMO I added to the crankcase bumped it up to below the 8RT stamp on the dipstick.

Uploading a movie now. I will link to it when the upload is done.
 
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Just running it in the chassis is probably not helping much (though, granted, you do say it was better last time). It may be better to just concentrate on the rest of the truck and then tackle the smoke issue when it is driving.

That said, what the hell, why not just buy a gasket set and pull the motor - pan off, heads off, pistons out. free up the rings, make sure the valves are all working nice and free.

Don't get drawn into a full rebuild, just clean well and reassemble. The crank and cam etc can stay in place.

Then when it is time to run and drive it, you can have some confidence that the motor is in an ok state.

Mart.
 
Mart said:
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Don't get drawn into a full rebuild, just clean well and reassemble. The crank and cam etc can stay in place.
...

Mart.
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Exactly what I did when I first got my truck, $60 for a set of gaskets gives a lot of confidence (provided you don't find a real problem). A great opportunity to flush out the crap in the water jackets, too.
 
I wanted to see how well it ran before I pulled it out, and the bed/cab off. The plan right now is for a flatbed, but high enough to still use the rear fenders.
 
That must be the wrong video. It took me to a shoebox and no smoke coming out the breather , for that matter I couldn't see the breather.
 
Mart has your best solution. Open it up and clean it out. Sounds good in the video. Most likely a case of stuck rings. The MMO may fix the problem but you really need to be able to drive it to find out.
 
Well then, it sounds like a ring cleaning is in order. I need to pull the engine/cab/bed, and get going on the whole truck.
 
Wouldn't it also smoke out of the tailpipe if it was getting blow by from stuck rings? There was not a sigle bit of smoke out of of the exhaust. Only the breather.
 
FordCustom said:
Wouldn't it also smoke out of the tailpipe if it was getting blow by from stuck rings? There was not a sigle bit of smoke out of of the exhaust. Only the breather.
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Yes I would agree with you but you can have blowby and still have a decent engine especially with no smoke out the exhaust. Seems odd that smoke is coming out of the breather as that should be an air inlet not outlet. I see you have the road draft tube in place. Anything coming out of it? Maybe it is plugged with sludge. Breather tube inlet is in the lifter valley and road draft inlet is crankcase via a baffle. I think before you go crazy tearing the engine apart to clean rings just pull intake and pan clean it all out then run again. If it is just some blowby but no blue smoke out the exhaust I say run it and work on other stuff.
 
Nah, it's clear all the way through( road draft) I wonder if there's any other places where it could be plugged to make it blow out of the intake breather? I asked the following before but didn't really get an answer. Is there any chance that over filling the oil even by a little could cause this? I will have to watch and see if anything is coming out of the road draft tube. Maybe there's something plugged internally in the intake or block that would cause it to blow out the breather?

Just questioning the cause really. The fact that it runs and this well, is enough to make me happy. Anything else I can deal with as it comes.
 
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