Question for TP/LTH users, oil smoke @ high RPM?
 

So for as long as I have been without cats on my car, at high rpm (6K+) on throttle close I get some oil smoke.

The video makes it look pretty bad, and it's noticeable for sure, but I'm inclined to think it's not that big of a deal.

It changes a bit with which oil I use, some oils have been much worse, others not as bad as what you see there... This is Mobil 1 0w40.

The engine had been warmed up for around 20 minutes, including some revving, before this video was taken. I don't know if it does it as badly when it is cold, but I won't be revving so high when the engine is cold no matter what, so I guess I'll never know haha.

The question for me is:

A - Valve Seals?
B - Rings?

I know it isn't PCV blow-by as my PCV tubes are clean and dry after the catch cans, checked that first.

Again, it's ALWAYS done this, this is just the first I've asked about it.

Edit: Just to clarify, I specified TP/LTH users because with cats, the oil smoke was never observed, presumably because the cat takes care of it, or something. That's why I called out those with similar setups, because presumably if you have cats, you won't see the smoke. :D

If you let the car sit overnight, is there any smoke at startup? That's a usual sign of valve seal wear

you are running M1 0W40, did you let the oil get up to temp before revving? if you didnt then it will burn a little bit and afiak it is normal because the oil is like water when cold

What I see from the video is the smoke appear when you let go of the throttle and then the intake goes into full vacuum which would pull the oil in by the valve stem seal.

Normal wear and tear.

he did mentioned this.

a warm engine can still mean cold oil

just because your engine is no longer idling high doesnt mean your oil is up to temp, it just means your coolant is up to temp, i know when leaving my car running for 20mins, my oil temps are nowhere near 160F

no where near 160F after 20mins ?
I guess mine get up to temps quite faster than yours then.

Part of the warm up process, for me, is to gently rev into VVEL land ~5500rpm (after it's idled a few minutes) because that's how you can put heat into the oil.

It was around 165-170 indicated when I started this video, right at tstat open ~183 when I stopped. Dropped back to ~170 immediately.

No smoke on start up, only on full vacuum. I'm thinking it's intake valve seals as well, Megan.

Maybe I'll get one of those fiber optic scopes and pull the intake plenum. See if I can get a peek down at the intake valves and see if there's oil gunk all over the stems from leakage...

Or maybe I'll just ignore it until I blow up, rebuild or swap out the engine. lol

You cannot look through the intake valves when the car is off, they'll all be closed
Thanks VVEL!

Unless I see it under load on the highway I can't comment.

What I will comment is revving and engine without load is just asking for trouble! That video was a huge no no by almost every engine builder in the universe and should be avoided.

LOL :icon18:

Was for the purposes of this video only, not something I do regularly.

Wasn't bouncing off the rev limiter, the valves aren't going to float at the RPMs the engine was seeing and it's got over 38K miles of break in done, it's not going to hurt anything at all. :tup:

Doesn't do it under load, only on lift. Never noticed it on the highway, but did notice it on the dyno, again only after lift.

I just meant the valve stems and the backs of the valves. If it is sucking substantial amounts of oil, I would think there would be evidence of it there? I dunno!

Makes sense now, and I guess if there is enough oil being burnt or dripping down, you might see darker valves, but not sure

I guess I can only say piston rings then, maybe valve. The vacuum increase at high revs could be sucking oil into the chamber. Under wot you should have a lot of bow by but since you don't go wot 24/7 you're probably not seeing a big drop in oil or filling the catch can up fast. At this point I'd go buy a compression kit from autozone for like $40 and test the cylinders and see what you get. The manual should post a range for healthy motors.

gives me something to do when i get home from work, ill report back later if mine does it

also note what oil you have! :tup:

Any oil consumption to go with the smoke?

redline 5w30 changed ~500 miles ago

Not enough for me to tell.

There is next to no vacuum under WOT so its not sucking oil by the piston ring neither by the valve seal at WOT
you would see it when he was revving up his engine .. only when he released the gas pedal that by the time the un-burn oil travel to the exit we were seeing blue smoke which is during vaccum created by releasing the gas pedal which close the TB & VVEL.

the exhaust gas was relatively clear when he was actually revving the engine.

what is more prone to wear , rubber or piston ring ? anyway valve stem seal are a common problem. there is no sign on that video that show the piston ring to be defective.

my guess, based on prior cars without cats, is youre seeing the AFR become quickly very pig rich as the throttle closes and revs drop, and some of that fuel igniting late causing some smoke out the exhaust. i had one car that would actually shoot a small flame doing that exact same thing.

pig rich would show black smoke coming out , not blue-ish smoke which is Oil.
but I see what you are saying ;)

There is some black smoke when revving "up". If you watch the video in HD you can see the smoke + heat ripples when the throttle is open.

It is running really rich right now, will be fixing that soon.

The smoke you see poof out after the throttle closes is oil smoke for certain.

if i drive for 20 mins then yes it gets to temp but sitting there and idling for 20 mins will not get it up to 160F


have someone follow you and see if you are burning oil under load on the highway or something, if you are then i would check your intake tubes for oil if you dont have oil catch cans installed, if there is oil in your intakes than you might want to check your compression and see if you lost any(that would also explain your smoke because oil is being sprayed into your intakes via PCV valve) and if there isnt, you will want to check your engine out anyways since you might be leaking oil through a seal or something

He's got catch cans.

What do your plugs look like?

i guess a better way to check if he has bad seals is to do a compression test and a blow down test afterwards if compression is low

hope you find out what is going on shovelman

Tried what you did tonight, no smoke here (well a bit of black smoke from running rich but nothing blueish like you showed) sorry if that didnt help.

Yes I know. That's why I said high REVS. Meaning the rpms are up there without load since he told me it only happens on lift off. If I meant high rpm at wot, I'd of said that. Figured he'd understand since we both knew he was talking about lift off.


Do I hear a echo? Ha

Compression test won't show bad valve seals. A leak down test won't either.

He as a couple of worn valve seals. Nothing more.

White smoke on start up. Water in the exhaust. Condensation.
White smoke when running. Water in the combustion somewhere.
Blue smoke when letting off of throttle. Valve seals.
Blue smoke when taking off. Most likely rings.
Black smoke. Fuel mixture issues.

Pretty much what I was thinking.

Problem is that it's quite the ordeal to get to the intake valve seals... :(

I wouldn't worry about it unless you are loosing more then normal amount of oil.

Yeah, might just experiment with different oils to minimize it.

At least you're not a crop-duster.

lol, in this context, I am unsure what you mean or how to respond.

You ever get behind someone, who is blowing out a trail of blue smoke the whole time you are behind them. :icon14:

Hope its a quick fix OP and goodluck, I run Non Res'd TP though no smoke here but I do get a funky smell whenever I'm at a stoplight with the windows down but I've seen here in forums that that's normal? O.o

I'm no Genious, but I did stay n a Holiday N Xpress!... I'll say it's N-harent in teh VVEL system of dis VQ37VHR...
Drink'n a quart of oil in ONE K miles is easy....High Revs will do this...
I've never w1tnessed dis in my Z, but I've never recorded the Xhaust flow Either! I can smell teh sh!+ 93 unleaded octane burn'N too, nas+Y!

Isn't it a lot more effort to type up a post in whatever language that was? Does something like that just make autocorrect say "**** it, I quit?"