Is your car smoking from the exhaust pipe?
Reader wemerson was kind enough to correct me on my metaphor in the previous post about tracking down the sources of whining in your life. Turns out that my use of “white smoke” was incorrect. Many thanks – and I made the correction.
To share the information and prevent future slightly-appropriate-metaphor-makers from repeating my error, here’s how to tell what’s wrong with your car based on the color of smoke coming out of your tailpipe. From trustmymechanic.com:
- White smoke: White smoke is caused by water and or antifreeze entering the cylinder, and the engine trying to burn it with the fuel. The white smoke is steam…
- Blue Smoke: Blue smoke is caused by engine oil entering the cylinder area and being burned along with the fuel air mixture. As with the white smoke, just a small drop of oil leaking into the cylinder can produce blue smoke out the tailpipe…
- Black Smoke: Black smoke is caused by excess fuel that has entered the cylinder area and cannot be burned completely. Another term for excess fuel is “running rich.” Poor fuel mileage is also a common complaint when black smoke comes out of the tailpipe.
Related: in the event that a conclave at the Sistine Chapel has been voting on who the next Pope shall be, here’s what Wikipedia says to watch for in terms of smoke (emphasis added):
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