Lately I’ve noticed when I start my car there is a puff of white smoke that comes from the muffler. After investigating further I realized this is not smoke but steam with a hint of coolant.
Initially I thought “oh no! Blown headgasket!” but my car has not been over heating and the oil is not the milky color it would be.
But…the coolant does appear to be slightly brown in color, leading me to believe it may be the oil cooler?
I have not done a compression test nor have I checked the spark plugs to see if any are blasted clean from coolant leaks.
So any input into my issue would be appreciated. I know something is up, just not completely sure yet…
i dont think its what you get for buying a vw, but more what you get for buying a 4cyl. as 4cyl engines are almost always prone to this no matter what manufacturer it is.
wait this car is 4cyl right?
have you found the problem yet? its a nice car be shame to have to tear into the engine for a reason other then more power
I didn’t get a chance to run the tests today, school kept me longer than I anticipated, no smoke was noticed today though, I’m still in the dark as to what the issue is
due to their smaller size and fewer cylinders they have to do more work to achieve the same power output as a larger engine in a similar size car. therefore since theyre doing more work they are putting more wear and break down on internal parts, not just in actual tolerances but in molecular structure. they typically need more rpms which also attributes to that wear along with more fluctuation in heat cycles. so if theyre doing more work and under more stess then theyre more prone to failure. yes theyre getting better with designs but the majority of 4cylinder engines out there are still for “cheap eco throw away cars” so they are getting skimped on those designs and quality control.
Yeah, it can’t hurt to flush the coolant, I’ll probably do that this weekend. God knows how old it is, one of the downsides of buying private party used cars.
