wandawoods Posted September 4, 2003 Posted September 4, 2003 the car is 98 ES300 136k after car parks a few hours (may not have be the 1st start in the morning) a big puff of white smoke will come out of the exhaust pipe, and it disappears after about 10~15sec. 1st gear runs to 3800~4000rpm before it will auto-shift to next gear. rpm needle swings unsually wide under normal driving condition. can anyone give me a diagnosis? thanks for your time!
SKperformance Posted September 4, 2003 Posted September 4, 2003 white smoke is coolant i guess it is drippig down into the cylinders you need to have a compression test to see which one it might be but it more than likely is the head gasket leaking which may or may not show on a compression test the rpms will rev high when the car is cold until it has warmed up it is natural for it
wandawoods Posted September 4, 2003 Author Posted September 4, 2003 white smoke is coolant i guess it is drippig down into the cylinders you need to have a compression test to see which one it might be but it more than likely is the head gasket leaking which may or may not show on a compression test the rpms will rev high when the car is cold until it has warmed up it is natural for it thanks for the hints! will have the mechanic looking into them. the 1st gear can go as high as 4000rpm even the car is running for more than 20~30 min! it looks pretty weird that the RPM needle goes up and down with big swing unlike the SC400/LS400 and other non-lex cars I have. i'm just afraid something really bad is going on...
SKperformance Posted September 4, 2003 Posted September 4, 2003 ok if it is after 20-30 minutes then there is aproblem it might be internal of the tranny if the switch is not opening inside ot open the flow of hat tranny fluid to the cold part as it stay locked until warm when i the last time you had the fluid changed are you using the ect button?
wandawoods Posted September 4, 2003 Author Posted September 4, 2003 ok if it is after 20-30 minutes then there is aproblemit might be internal of the tranny if the switch is not opening inside ot open the flow of hat tranny fluid to the cold part as it stay locked until warm when i the last time you had the fluid changed are you using the ect button? I did some more 'test driving' today. if O/D is on, and step on the gas hard, the 1st gear can go over *5000rpm* before 2nd gear will kick in! this thing is defenitely not normal! and this happened after 30-min worth of driving so it wasn't because of a 'cold' engine. on the LS400 and SC400 I have, no matter how hard we hit the gas, the 1st gear w/OD on will never go over said 3K rpm before 2nd grear takes over! (one thing I can say is that the 400's are really fast cars!) we just bought this ES300 about 3 weeks ago, and tran. fluid was flushed and changed about 2 weeks ago, and it was pretty bad. now I am worry it may have big time tranny problems. looks like I got to get it checked on the double!
KingofHudson Posted September 5, 2003 Posted September 5, 2003 White smoke can also be transmission fluid that is being burned to a leak into the manifold. This would translate to late shifts and gear slips which you seem to be experiencing. Check your trany fluid to see if it’s low if it fill it up and check it often to see if the level goes down. If it does that confirms you are burning trany fluid which will require some garage time. Unless you have skills.
bbsal Posted September 5, 2003 Posted September 5, 2003 I did some more 'test driving' today. if O/D is on, and step on the gas hard, the 1st gear can go over *5000rpm* before 2nd gear will kick in! this thing is defenitely not normal! and this happened after 30-min worth of driving so it wasn't because of a 'cold' engine.on the LS400 and SC400 I have, no matter how hard we hit the gas, the 1st gear w/OD on will never go over said 3K rpm before 2nd grear takes over! (one thing I can say is that the 400's are really fast cars!) we just bought this ES300 about 3 weeks ago, and tran. fluid was flushed and changed about 2 weeks ago, and it was pretty bad. now I am worry it may have big time tranny problems. looks like I got to get it checked on the double! acually if your hitting the gas hard or flooring the car it will rev to 6500 rpm before it shifts gears two second!if i floor my car it changes somewere between 6500 and 7000 rpms.thats normal!i never even heard of a car the changes gears at 3000 rpms if you hitting the gas hard!i think your trans is normal but the white smoke is a problem that could be the head gaskets!
wandawoods Posted September 5, 2003 Author Posted September 5, 2003 White smoke can also be transmission fluid that is being burned to a leak into the manifold. This would translate to late shifts and gear slips which you seem to be experiencing. Check your trany fluid to see if it’s low if it fill it up and check it often to see if the level goes down. If it does that confirms you are burning trany fluid which will require some garage time. Unless you have skills. I did not actually hit the gas to floor. I would say maybe halfway in short burst, driving mild up-hill and with OD on, and 1st gear registered 5000+ rpm before 2nd gear kicked in....
wandawoods Posted September 11, 2003 Author Posted September 11, 2003 the situation worsens. now, whenever the car parks for couple hours, it spits out big puff of smoke in light-blue, and it does have 'exhaust' smell unlike much less smelly white 'steam' it used to have. one mechanic suspects it's 'valve sten seal' inside the engine!? any clues anyone?
SKperformance Posted September 11, 2003 Posted September 11, 2003 get a compression test an a leak down test it will pin point your problem
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