cold engine and smoke

[BiffStroganoffsky]

Alrighty dudes and dudettes, I have my Solitaire back after replacing the master and slave clutch cylinders in the wagon for my sister. It's good to have the Sol back but I 'see' issues now that I am spending more time with her.

First, the blower motor made such a racket when I turned it on to defrost the windshield and pieces of what look like tissue paper started flying out the side vents! Is it fairly simple to disassemble the vent/blower to remove the debris? Hope so.

Second, the coolant temp gauge never rises above cold. I'm thinking that Sol is due for a new thermostat...like Geo had to do. However, I also did notice that I am get smoke from the tail pipe even after driving for ten miles which should get the engine up to temp. I probably never noticed this before because of the exhaust leak but it is readily visible now. The smoke is greyish and I don't appear to be loosing coolant so I wonder if this has some link to the thermostat.?. Could there be a bad temp sensor or some other that is causing the computer to run the engine rich?

I'm glad to have Solitaire back with her close ratio gears (closer than the LX wagon) but these issues and the foggy windows and wet seats are quite annoying. I can't wait for drier weather! I did run with the top off and windows down last night just to air out for the heck of it. Who cares if my face was all red and ears numb from the drive!

[Geo VP]

Originally posted by BiffStroganoffsky:
Alrighty dudes and dudettes, I have my Solitaire back after replacing the master and slave clutch cylinders in the wagon for my sister. It's good to have the Sol back but I 'see' issues now that I am spending more time with her.

First, the blower motor made such a racket when I turned it on to defrost the windshield and pieces of what look like tissue paper started flying out the side vents! Is it fairly simple to disassemble the vent/blower to remove the debris? Hope so.

Second, the coolant temp gauge never rises above cold. I'm thinking that Sol is due for a new thermostat...like Geo had to do. However, I also did notice that I am get smoke from the tail pipe even after driving for ten miles which should get the engine up to temp. I probably never noticed this before because of the exhaust leak but it is readily visible now. The smoke is greyish and I don't appear to be loosing coolant so I wonder if this has some link to the thermostat.?. Could there be a bad temp sensor or some other that is causing the computer to run the engine rich?

I'm glad to have Solitaire back with her close ratio gears (closer than the LX wagon) but these issues and the foggy windows and wet seats are quite annoying. I can't wait for drier weather! I did run with the top off and windows down last night just to air out for the heck of it. Who cares if my face was all red and ears numb from the drive!

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Answer #1: Yes it shouldn't be to bad to get in there and clean it out, will probably have to remove the glove box door though. Mine has done that in the summer with the A/C on, frost on the tube in the box that break off and then come out the vents (little snow flakes is what it looked like to my wife and me when it did it, very strange looking).

Answer #2: Yep, it running only in the warm up mode (very rich), that's why or most likey the reason for the smoke. Putting a new thermosat in should clean it up for you and better gas milage and being able to pass the smog test if you have that down there.

Hope that helps some for you.

Geo
President
Team Sol of Washington

[DaleSol110]

thats exactly what i was thinking. Your car is running too rich on the oil. Exactly Geo.

[BiffStroganoffsky]

Thanks guys. I should have ordered the thermostat when I got the rest of the parts...oh well. As for the wet seats, I've got two pairs of 'wetsuit' seat covers on order! [img]tongue.gif[/img]