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As recently determined, the PO of my car routed the valve cover ventilation to a catch can instead of back into the carb. I noticed that it's smoking a lot. Is that normal? Here's how it looks. It often smokes even more than that. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQ3nq1W2-tg I cleaned out the catch can yesterday, and it still smokes. So I guess that smoke is coming from the engine. But... why would it smoke under the valve cover? Shouldn't that area be sealed, except for oil delivery? Are my valves not tight?

I think I have a real problem now. I don't know if I caused it, or if I just noticed it because this is the first time that I've been around my car at night - other than last night, which I drove it around the neighborhood after dark for 5 minutes. I posted about the rear side marker bulbs and finally went out a few minutes ago to try the new bulbs. I inserted the new bulb in the left rear side marker and turned it. It never felt solidly in - but I tried turning on the running lights. No light from the marker bulb. I pressed gently on the bulb and it flickered on/off and sparked a bit. It was a bright bulb. (this is the 12 v 4 w 2.8 cp bulb). I removed it and inserted the original bulb. Same thing happened. I spent a few more seconds trying to seat the bulb. At that point I noticed the other lights along the rear flickering. (I had the trunk open and could see them from inside the trunk). I turned off the running lights and removed the side marker bulb at this point. I removed the cover from the inside of the back left turn signal lights, looked (it looked ok) and did not touch any part of the turn signal wiring. I returned to the side marker and carefully wiggled the rubber cup on the back side. I thought that I might need to get in from the back to tighten up the copper connectors. I still couldn't get the cup off and didn't want to force it. I tried inserting the original bulb again. At that point, my wife noticed that the right rear running light on the right tail light was out. I hadn't noticed that before. I looked over, and then noticed that the license plate lights were very dim. This is the first time I've really looked at my car at dusk, and hadn't noticed anything about the lights before. I sat down to take a picture of the lights. I started with the left rear turn signal, which looked normal. (this is with the running lights on, but the head lights are off) I got up to take a pic of the right side, which was off - and as I took the picture, the light came on again and the license lights brightened. I stopped for 2 seconds to think about that, and suddenly smelled smoke. It was coming from the top-right corner (if you look at it from the rear of the car) of the left turn signal light. I ran to shut off the running lights. I felt around and noticed that the outside metal bracket of the left side marker was slightly warm. (The light had not been in the socket except for only a few seconds while I was wiggling it.) I felt on the inside of the side marker - on the rubber cup and the wire, and both were warm. The wire was too warm. There's no way that it should have been that warm. I felt the other wires and none were even slightly warm.

Hello all, I very rarely start a post because the search function consistently proves itself to be an amazing resource but I'm a little stumped. My tii is back on the road after a year or so in the garage and the car is running great aside from recently starting to smoke as I accelerate away from a stop. The longer the stop the more smoke. I started noticing it after a brutal traffic jam that had me sitting in bumper to bumper traffic for a couple hours. By the time I got the car home it was billowing smoke pulling away from a stop. Since then it has been less noticeable but I do still notice it. It’s definitely oil burning rather than coolant. I’m using 20-50 non synthetic oil. This weekend I did a compression test (throttle open on a warm engine) and got much better results that I would have expected. #1 @ 160 lbs #2 @ 153 lbs #3 @ 150 lbs #4 @ 160 lbs I have no idea how many miles are on the motor but after a recent valve and K-fish adjustment it pulls very strong, runs cool, and idles perfectly. I even get around 24 mpg. All of your suggestions are very much appreciated.

Hey folks: I've made a few observations, maybe enough for the wisdom of the forum to point me in the right direction. Background info: '72 tii, owned for a year. Original block and head. Unknown amount of work done on motor. Running 20-50 wt oil. Located in SF Bay Area. I've had these symptoms since I bought the car but things seem to have gotten worse with the nights dipping into the mid 20's. Two problems: At cold start, the oil pressure light stays on for probably 5-8 seconds. Cold start produces a prodigious amount of grey smoke out the tailpipe. (in addition to the expected water vapor seen on colder mornings). Things I've observed: Measured oil pressure with a gauge. At cold start, pressure sits at near zero but when pressure does appear (in 5-8 seconds) it jumps to 75 psi and stays constant. Sometimes I hear a squeal at startup that sounds like a slipping fan belt. But I've replaced the fan belt. I think it might be coming from a rocker on a cam lobe that has run out of lubrication but then quiets down when oil from the spray-bar finally makes it to the cam/rocker interface. Someone had suggested that the oil-spray bar might have sprung a big leak causing the delay in the build up of oil pressure and subsequently flooding the top-end. Which would then leak down worn valve guides causing the big smoke. However, this morning I removed the valve cover and cranked the engine until I got oil pressure to the top end. There was no evidence of the spray-bar hemorrhaging oil. I've lately checked the compression (cold because at the moment I don't want to run the motor up to temperature). All four cylinders were very close to 150psi. Not as good as I have measured on this car but consistent and suggests that I don't have one bad hole. Also each plug was badly fouled but, again, the fouling was consistent across the board. Plan of attack: It's clear to me that I need some head work. The smoke and the fouling of plugs tells me that valve guides and seals need help. I'm in the position of being able to remove my head and bring it to a local specialist (any recommendations? ideally in the North Bay). I'm comfortable doing the grunt work for top-end work. What I cannot do at my home is pull the engine for bottom end work. I also do not have the budget to do a full-on engine rebuild. I need to spend my car-budget money judiciously. On the other hand, it doesn't seem to make sense to do all the head work and still have sluggish oil pressure on start up. If the problem lies in the oil pump itself, then (as I understand it) access to the oil pump requires either pulling the engine or removing the front sub-frame (no?). Malfunctioning check valve? This just occurred to me. Is there some sort of check valve on this engine that holds oil up in the top end when the engine is turned off? That would explain why so much pumping is needed at cold start to get oil up to the valve train. Thank you in advance Rich

Hello everyone so the thing is I have put my 02 back on ther road after a full restoration and after one month/aprox. 2000km later there have been some issues that popped out. Despite engine had a full rebuild with all new bearings, been honed, new piston rings, new valve steam seals, im having a major issue with smoke coming out of exhaust, its blue so obviously its burning oil, but where? Most noticeable is when idling and when releasing a gas pedal (in that 2000km period he took 2 litres of oil).... Im running out of ideas where to start fixing that problem Some say use thicker oil (currently im running Castrol 10W-40 part synthetic), others says ignition/distributor have something to do with this...my major fear is that its actually something wrong inside the engine :/ And the other big problem is noise coming out of the engine after it comes to working temperature, valves has been set to 0.15mm clearance and the engine is running beautifully when its cold, but after a while it gets this noise ( trrrrrrr sound) only when Im on throttle. I heard M10 was known for being extremely sensitive about worn out rocker arms, and mine are still original. Would you guess this is the reason for noise or there might be something else?? I appreciate all the help thanks

Background: this is a '73 with the original engine, pertronix points and a Weber 32/36 with water choke. The car hasn't been driven regularly for some years, but everything "works" - I've been mainly doing r&r on things like new plugs, wires, oil, filters, seals, setting timing, etc.. Now I am ready to go out on the road, but have a couple of issues before I do so. The main issue is I seem to be running very rich - there is grey smoke out of the exhaust once the engine starts to warm up, and the plugs are sooty. I'd like to put some miles on the engine before getting too hung up on tuning etc., but the state it's in is producing too much smoke to drive without a gas mask My feeling is that the carb is set up incorrectly. Here's what I have: 1) brass floats: level set to 41mm when valve closed, measured from gasket to extremity of both floats, level set to 51mm when floats at bottom of travel 2) idle jets: 50 on primary, 55 on secondary (I also tried 60 on primary, but that was predictably worse) 3) main jets: 125 on primary, 127 on secondary 4) correction jets: 175 and 170 5) emulsion: both F50 6) discharge: 50 I start with the idle mixture screw 1 1/2 turns out from fully closed - the engine starts (but without enthusiasm). Turning clockwise (leaner) the engine starts to stumble. Engine seems happiest when the screw is about 2 turns out - which is apparently OK according to what I've read. Vacuum on the manifold is 20mmHg at idle. I'm pretty confident I have no vacuum leaks. Air filter is removed for these tests. Observation: before the engine warms up, if I open the choke butterflys by hand, revs go up. This suggest that I'm running too rich, doesn't it? After the engine warms up, butterflys open completely, as they should. By the time the engine is warmed up, the guff from the exhaust is choking! Any comments/suggestions? Any local experts in Pasadena who'd be prepared to take a look? I feel like I may be missing something basic related or unrelated to the carb!

I've about had it trying to fix my rich running / smoking exhaust problem. I can't see what is wrong - everything looks fine, but it's just so frustrating to keep firing the thing up after the latest fiddling around, only to have it warm up and start belching smoke again. I've been weeks off and on messing around with the Weber, the timing, plugs, wires, dizzy, ignition etc.. It started out fun, but now it's gone sour Any bright ideas? Anyone with a known good Solex they want to dispose of? Or should I just put the car up on Ebay and call it a wash?

My 02 starts up nice but as soon as I warm her up, heavy thick white smoke comes out of the exhaust. So much i feel like my neighbors get mad at how much im polluting and I Know forsure it will get me pulled over. I want to know what I should do becuse I think it might be the head gasket but im not sure? I was thinking about getting the whole engine rebuilt but I have no idea how much that would cost? If anyone has any ideas or suggestion please let me know. It's really been on my mind since ive noticed it. I do not want to destroy my car. ilove her.