Smoke coming from engine,,,any ideas?

dwayneburke

Smoke coming from engine,,,any ideas?

Its an Opel Astra 99. I noticed a oile leak in the past 5 days or so that is gradually getting a lot worse. Opened up bonet and noticed the smoke was coming from under the engine "ecotec" was written on it, just down from where you put in the oil. Obviously by the sound of it i know next to nothing about enginess but mechanic is coming tomorrow so does anyone have any ideas as to what is wrong?

The oile leak seems to be coming out close to where the smoke seems to be coming from? Is this going to be a big job by the sounds of it?

I know its fairly pointless posting this but if anyone has come across my problem i would greatly appreciate it.

AMurphy

I'd suggest your valve cover is loose and/or the gasket is broken or just leaking, the oil is then getting onto the exhaust manifold and producing smoke. nothing unusual about that.

Seth Brundle

get thee to thy mechanic!

dwayneburke

thou'st thy mechanic has coveted said vehicle this morn!!

Seth Brundle

erm, verily

dwayneburke

Tis way too early to be talking like this!!!

Easing into it with a bucket cup of java..waiting beside the phone for the mechanic to tell me it will be >€1000 to fix!!!

Seth Brundle

a grand? What did the mechanic say was wrong with it?

dwayneburke

its a running joke between himself and me.....everytime he rings he always gives me a mad shock by picking some majorly inflated price just to hear my reaction!!!

Bad fecker...Now when he rings i dont know if hes messin or not!!!

Come to think of it i should have but a few dead rats in the engine to get the fecker back!!

On second thoughts he would probably charge me for removing them!!

kluivert

Sounds like theres oil leaking onto the exhaust pipe which is very hot which burns the oil - smoke.

What the 'ell is wrong that its going to be €1000, you can pick up an engine for less than that.

The Ecotec engines are very good, i also have a 99 Opel Astra 1.4 16v with 81k on the clock and it sounds better than 1 or 2 yr old Astras out there.

Now let me tell you a Astra ownership Secret.

When Opel built the ecotec 1.4 engine they made one of the four clyinders to close to the edge of the engine block. The rubber gasket at this spot is thinner than the rest of the block and therefore is prone to leak, i changed my head gasket at 55k to an alloy gasket which is stronger than the rubber one at an Opel Garage it costed me 270e and my car was leaking oil as well.

I think you are being ripped off and i would get an Opel dealer to look at it. Get an estimate and shop around.

AMurphy

Assuming the rocker/valve cover gasket. $40 for hte part and 1 hr to exchange.

Course it could be simply loose, in which case 10~20 minutes to get at all the nuts to tighten. Depending on the engine, some inlet manifolds wrap over the top of the engine and make it very difficult to get at the nuts in the first place.
Another rare possibility is the oil pressure switch is leaking oil through the switch body. Rare, but I've seem it twice.