In the last three months or so my car has started to smoke white when I put my foot down, and it is getting worse. Conventional wisdom, Google and YouTube all seem to agree that the two most likely causes are the turbo or the piston rings. What I can't seem to figure out is how to establish which of the two is the likelier cause in my case. My only idea so far has been to pull the air feed out of the EGR housing and run the engine for a bit. But this hasn't really helped. When I rev it I get a fine spray of oil from the pipe, but the exhaust smoke is still white. I would have reasoned that with the turbo taken out of the equation altogether, the persistence of white smoke from the exhaust could only be bad piston rings. But then again, maybe there's a nice buildup of oil in the intake manifold? There is less white smoke in the exhaust when the pipe is off, but again, maybe only because with no boost pressure at all there is always going to be? I really have no idea.

 

I'm prepared to replace both the turbo and the rings, but was really hoping not to have to do both if not necessary. Does anyone know of a better way to establish the cause?

 

 

White smoke is not normally oil it’s either diesel or water are you sure it’s burnin oil ? Also could be coolant burning threw a broken egr cooler, are you loosing any coolant ??

Edited 28 May, 20188 yr by bradh

I'm losing oil by the liter. Probably should have mentioned that to begin with. Lots of oil leaving the engine somewhere, no doubt about it. And the smell of the exhaust is definitely burning oil as opposed to fuel. 

 

I've now taken the pipe off the turbo that runs on to the intercooler and had a little feel of the turbine. No play at all in or out and a very small amount up and down. 

 

As for performance, the cars pulls like it always has, only now with Spy Hunter smoke screen permanently enabled. 

Edited 28 May, 20188 yr by jronnquist
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Could post a video clip if it helps. 

If your turbo seals are tight id guess the ring option how many miles your engine done ? Could always do a compression test see if that helps with identifying witch bore is leaking 

https://youtu.be/iw2LVHJQPlQ

 

104000 miles

That’s blue smoke to me defiantly oil :( unusual to see rings go at the miles you have done 

Yes, I've been told the same thing. One theory someone proposed was that the car only had 40000 miles on the clock when I bought it in July 2015. It was seven years old. Apparently something in the cylinder (rings or walls?) can glaze up and allow oil to pass. Sound plausible? 

If it had been stood for years then possibly but it would of started to burn oil right away,  have you had the sump off at all ? Could of broken a ring plus you can look up into The bores with the sump off see any whiteness marks 

Thats oil smoke, but try simple things like checking the breather system (if the engine can't breath it will produce blue smoke) blocked breather hoses can be quite common, it could also also be valve stem oil seals have gone hard and letting oil through down the valve guide.

 

Also do a wet and dry compression test (don't use a compression tester designed for a petrol engine, diesel compression is much much higher and would blow it to pieces.)

 

The idea of the wet test is the spoonful of oil you put in the cylinder will seal the rings and make higher compression if the are fine, if they ain't the oil will do nothing.

So, after almost two weeks of procrastination, opinion gathering and various attempts at diagnosis, the exact cause of the problem remained elusive. As I plan to keep the car for a while I have gone for broke and disassembled the engine to the block. Two of the pistons had major carbon buildup on them and there were bad score marks in the cylinders. The turbo is not great, but not that bad either. At the end of the day I have a feeling the cause is a combination of several things, all common problems on this engine type at this millage. Worn oil seal rings, a failing turbo, ageing valve stem seals and so on. So I'm taking this opportunity to rebuild the engine from the ground up. The scaring in the cylinders has come out and the both pistons and the head have been sent away for cleaning. The head will get a new set of valve stem seals and new cam bearings at the shop. Replacement turbo has also arrived, along with all bolts, gaskets and parts that will need to be replaced, including cam belt, tensioner and water pump. All parts are genuine. Total bill is around £1200. Luckily I am able to do 80% of the work myself under professional supervision at the garage of a good friend, and I'm not paying for the work I can't do myself or alone. If I was fronting the £50-per-hour bill for labor the cost of the project would be prohibitive. So we'll see how it goes. I'll post some pics of the rebuild on here once It gets under way after the weekend. 

9 hours ago, jronnquist said:

So, after almost two weeks of procrastination, opinion gathering and various attempts at diagnosis, the exact cause of the problem remained elusive. As I plan to keep the car for a while I have gone for broke and disassembled the engine to the block. Two of the pistons had major carbon buildup on them and there were bad score marks in the cylinders. The turbo is not great, but not that bad either. At the end of the day I have a feeling the cause is a combination of several things, all common problems on this engine type at this millage. Worn oil seal rings, a failing turbo, ageing valve stem seals and so on. So I'm taking this opportunity to rebuild the engine from the ground up. The scaring in the cylinders has come out and the both pistons and the head have been sent away for cleaning. The head will get a new set of valve stem seals and new cam bearings at the shop. Replacement turbo has also arrived, along with all bolts, gaskets and parts that will need to be replaced, including cam belt, tensioner and water pump. All parts are genuine. Total bill is around £1200. Luckily I am able to do 80% of the work myself under professional supervision at the garage of a good friend, and I'm not paying for the work I can't do myself or alone. If I was fronting the £50-per-hour bill for labor the cost of the project would be prohibitive. So we'll see how it goes. I'll post some pics of the rebuild on here once It gets under way after the weekend. 

 

Gutted to read buddy iv got a bottom end 96k done if that’s of any use ??

Greetings, i have just started to attempt the exact same repair as yourself. My turbo failed just after I bought the car, initially it was white smoking, with a hint of blue smoke. The turbo failed and I decided to get a remanufacturer turbo with warranty. I fit this and it literally lasted around 300 miles before the dreaded supercharger whine came back. I'm thinking the blue smoke is a combination of the turbo failing and piston rings, when the car warms up it runs very lumpy and smoking something chronic. I've started to strip the engine and removed the cylinder head. The sump and oil pump are off and waiting to remove the pistons now. I'm going to be doing pretty much simliar rebuild to yourself. I can do all the work myself which will reduce the cost massively, but like yourself will send the head away to be reconditioned. 

Do you have any links to manuals that you are using or have you bought the bentley manual? 

I didn't use any manuals. The garage where I did the work had at least two subject matter experts on hand and I basically drove them nuts with my endless stream of questions. I photographed (and made a long 4K video) of the engine all-around before I started and then placed every single thing I removed into its own clearly labelled (and numbered for sequence) zip-lock bag. What I did forget to do was score the pistons to indicate which came out of what cylinder. I marked them as I took them out with Tip-Ex, but then forgot to make the markings permanent before having them cleaned. Not very clever. 

 

As for the rebuild itself, things are definitely better now, but by no means perfect. I will be posting the issues in a separate thread, but the gist of it is that with everything back together I'm getting zero boost before 2000 RPM and my MPG has dropped by around a third. I've just ordered a VCDS setup for my laptop from Ross-Tech to get to the bottom of this. The system at the garage is sold by Snap On and doesn't seem to be much use. It produces no fault codes even with the MAF sensor unplugged. 

 

All that said, I did learn quite a bit and would be able to cut the job time in half if I started again, so if you have any questions I'd gladly do my best to answer.