Hi all, my car has been smoking for a while now when I go over 5800rpm. I've just changed the oil for the first time since I noticed the smoking and it would appear I have been overfilling the car due to an innacurate dipstick (5 litres drained out when dipstick showed 2/3 full, I measured in 4.75 litres and bairly hit first notch). Since refilling with less oil the smoke has lessened.
The only time I get a bad puff of smoke now is if I let the car get to around 90 degrees eg in traffic (vx220, normally sits around 87-89 degrees) and then hit high revs shortly after.
Yesterday I took the inlet manifold off to plug the egr hole and remove the pipe and noticed a pool of oil in the manifold. I'm wondering if the oil is entering through the small hole in the manifold between cylinders 2 and 3. Doesn't seem to be a lot of oil in the larger breather hose from the cam cover.
My theory is that the oil is getting through this port as it is only happening when the engine gets hot so that the oil is thin enough to pass through the tiny hole.
I'm thinking that I might block this port on the manifold to see if this cures the smoking rather than replacing the rings at this stage. Other option would be to fit a cooler thermostat so that the engine runs slighter cooler hopefull keeping the oil slightly thicker.
Do you guys have any thoughts on these two options, particularly blocking off the manifold breather (I have read that Courtenays do this with the SC conversion and just rely on the big cam cover breather).
Cheers
James