Smoke from exhaust? Mayo in the oil cap?

Forum Moderator Joined: 02 Mar 2004 Posts: 19978

Right in order to curb the endless posts about this I am doing a sticky, thats a message sticky not a toilet related problem!

Mayo in your oil cap. If the car is used for short journeys or not used all week only at the weekends etc then you will get mayo in the oil cap.

This is simple condensation. The oil has to get to 100 degrees and maintain that temp in order to boil off the water! if the car doesn't reach temp and maintain it long enough then the problem only gets worse.

Solution, a longish drive, 100 miles or so will sort the problem out.
Water dripping out the exhaust. Again if the car is used for short journeys or even just parks up when the ambient temp is cold then condensation will form inside the exhaust system.

The backbox should have a drainhole at the bottom front edge, this prevents large build ups of water in the back box. The other boxes don;t have drains and they can fill up. If you shake the exhaust you may hear the water sloshing about in the boxes.

Again this is normal, obviosuly cars rarely used will have more water build up in them than cars used to commute 100 miles a day.

Its nothing to worry about.
Steam from the exhaust, ruight first thing you have to remember is that a by product of combustion is water, for every gallon of fuel burned nearly a gallon of water is produced!

This is why on cold mornings etc you see white water vapour clouds emit from the exhausts of cars.

Again not a problem

Keep a watchfull eye on all the levels and if the coolant dissapears then you may have a problem.

Newbie Joined: 11 Mar 2006 Posts: 16

cheers for clearing this up..my cars been sitting a year and i thought that was a problem :lol: