I noticed this blue smog out of the tailpipe when I start my car in the mornings.
I'm sure it wasn't there before.
My father used to say that changing the valve seals may remedy the smog at start up only if the rings are in good shape, if there is a problem with the rings, then the smog will be there all the time and not only during start up.
Any other opinion?
Power is nothing without control
Mine did that for a while, too. That was when using Super Tech synthetic 10W-30. Using Rotella T 5W-40 more or less resolved the issue. It is most likely your valve stem seals, as you suspect, and/or the valve guides. If changing the seals is something you can do it sure won't hurt. My rings were fine. If you blow smoke when you take off from a traffic signal or when you accelerate in top gear you might have a ring issue. I am pretty sure that these cars did have leaky seals and guides, though. I had to add at least a little oil between OCI's on my car from 1989 until 2012. The Rotella oil minimized that.
A compression test would be a good start. Follow it up with a vacuum gauge test and you should be pretty close to the diagnosis.
Most likely valve guide seals though.
Dr_Snooz
"I like to take hammers, and just break stuff, just break stuff." - Beavis
1989 Honda Accord LX-i Coupe, 240k miles, MT swap, rear disc swap
Shop manual downloads available here: CLICK TO VIEW
The tell tale puff of blue smoke at start up is usually the valve seals. Don't know how many miles on yours, but looking to what oil you use is a possible easy fix. Many high mileage oils have 'seal conditioners' (usually a dose of group V oil) or like the Rotella DBMaster mentioned. I had this problem 5-6 years ago and started putting a quart or 2 of Redline (group V) oil in at every change. It's been many years and (have to check) about 30K miles ago and the problem has gone away completely. No oil consumption, no puff of blue smoke, and original valve seals. I'm at 160K miles on the car.
I was at 355,000 miles. The smoke went away and I was down to adding about 1/2 quart of oil every couple thousand miles. The Rotella is HDEO (Heavy Duty Engine Oil) primarily made for diesel engines, but it is approved for gas engines as well. It also contains levels of zinc comparable to high mileage motor oils.
I think I'll start by the oil change and try to find the ones you guys mentioned.
Also the vacuum gauge stuff was very interesting to read.
I'm glad I asked first, if I see an improvement after the oil change, chances are it will fix itself with the time and I don't need to mess with the valves and its adjustment. Thanks.
Power is nothing without control
thats why i buy the rotella oil from BJ's, i get it for $20 a case for conventional and 26$ for synthetic. Also a faulty PCV system can cause oil to be thrown up into the intake if the orifice tube on the back on the ban and or oil mist separator box is partially cloggedOriginally Posted by DBMaster
Last edited by gp02a0083; 10-02-2012 at 06:13 AM.
1989 Accord Lx-i hatchback (current DD project)
1986 Olds Cutlass 442 clone (never ending project)
3Geez resident body man
Owner of Wreck-less auto body
The oil change didn't help with the problem. Today I started my car and immediately ran to the back of the car, I saw no smog during the first 10 seconds, but then, the smog started to come out and lasted for 30 seconds and made a huge cloud. 20 seconds later there was no more smog coming out.
After that, I can do hard accelerations and I don't see any smog.
Next step is to check the PCV and related components.
I'll leave the valve seals change for the weekend...
Power is nothing without control
At least for Group V oil seal conditioning, it may take a month or more for the oil to soften and condition the valve seals and stop the leaking. I'm not sure what ingredients in the Rotella performs the magic. It must be more than just a thicker oil. IT has additional detergents as well to deal with the diesel soot.
Any more details on this Group V oil? Is it something I can buy at Autozone?
Power is nothing without control
Group V is synthetic Ester based oil. The only oil I know for sure has a good dose of grp V is Redline oils. I believe Mutol is group V based as well. Some 'high mileage' oils will use grp V but won't say how much. If you can get 1 qt of Redline in there, it should be enough for the seal softening effect. Group 4 especially, & Group 3 Synthetics do not treat seals so well. Grp 4 can actually cause them to dry out and shrink.
Mine would do that smoking from time to time. If the valve seals are as hardened as the crank and cam seals that I replaced, I am surprised the smoking is no worse.
Changing valve seals is not difficult to do - I did it on my Civic a while back. Yours look like the valve stem seals are the problem; the main thing is keeping the valves from falling inside the cylinder - I stuck rope inside the cylinder through the spark plug hole and turn the engine until the pistons compressed it against the valves of the cylinder I have to work on.
If it ain't broke... I fix it!
might as well replace the pcv
1989 Accord Lx-i hatchback (current DD project)
1986 Olds Cutlass 442 clone (never ending project)
3Geez resident body man
Owner of Wreck-less auto body
If it was your rings on deceleration you would create vacuum then when you accelerate you'll see a huge puff a smoke means rings
Valve stems can be the same as your creating vaccum on deceleration your sucking oil threw worn out valve stem/guides causing smoke but only happens on cold starts .which replacing em an going from there. Doing a valve adjustment
Doing a leak down test on wouldn't hurt either it will tell how healthy your valve seats ,rings an so on.
I had to diagnosis this a lot 9/10 was rings doing the deceleration test. Doing a heavy run loading the rings as well.
200+ ALL MOTOR LS VTEC
the chance is the valve stem seals are gone, it's not hard to fix, they have a tendency to complete disintegrate on the exhaust valves, I know there wasn't much left of mine, if you use the rope trick which is feeding a length of nylon rope into the spark plug hole, then bringing the piston up on compression, you wont have to use a compressor and air holding tool, I prefer this trick myself, you just need a valve spring compressing tool, the type that works with the head in place. it's also a good idea to cover the oil return holes in the head while removing the keepers, unless you want the fun of pulling the oil pan to retrieve one, the seal conditioning stuff doesn't work if most of the seal is long gone and turned to carbon, no point in snake oil treatments when the issue can be permanently fixed in a few hours on a weekend
Last edited by lostforawhile; 10-03-2012 at 08:16 PM.
If my valve seals ever start leaking again, I'll have to fix them. So far 25 years 160K miles on original, the engine is running great. I really didn't expect the Redline to solve the problem long term, but that was 6+ years and 30K miles ago.... I have no idea if it will solve Buzo's problem, just reporting my experience.
the problem with the seals is it isn't just a matter of softening the seal, there is nothing left of the seals most of the time, mine were so carbonized on the exhaust side, they would turn to dust by touching them, it's a pretty simple procedure to replace them, it just takes some time is all
Today we now know what crap oils the SF/SG grades of the late '80s were. Group V synthetic is not 'snake oil'. Ring packs clogged up and failed with carbon deposits are caused by poorly formulated oils as well. It may very well be too late for Buzo's valve seals to be saved. I'll be sure to report back if and when my valve seals ever fail.
My car is relatively low mileage too, but still 24 years old.
Edit: checked my records, I started putting Redline in for the startup blue smoke in Nov. 2004.
Last edited by g.frost; 10-04-2012 at 07:37 AM.
I'm just saying why not just fix them in the first place and not worry about it? these cars run pretty high cylinder head temps anyway, just due to design, because of the emissions, so they are not good to stem seals
I'm with g.frost. I've had these issues cleared up with changing to a high quality group V oil. Group V oils are great seal conditioners, and they tend to clean deposits well. I've seen plenty of gummed up A20 heads. In some cases, a good engine cleaning is all that's needed.
The reason I don't replace mine is there is nothing wrong with them. it's been 8 years since I saw any blue smoke and zero oil consumption, no blowby, PCV stays clean, runs great.
I would be curious to see if it would fix Buzo's cloud of blue smoke, but I wouldn't argue if he decides to go ahead and replace them. It's a cheap test to see if it works.
If Redline wasn't so expensive I would run it straight. I've been running 1qt 5W30 Redline to 3qts 5W30 Penzoil Platinum most of the time. It has really cleaned up under the valve cover too.
The PP itself is decent oil. It's my go-to oil.
I started using PP (5W30) in Nov 2004 when we got a 2005 Civic. I decided this one will only see synthetic oil. Now at 106K miles it still looks brand new under the valve cover. These oils are much better than what we had in '88. My old Accord took a bit of abuse before I woke up & cleaned it out.
Any of today's oil is better than the best oils from the 80's, outside of the then very expensive synthetics.
Since I am a "tester" with lots of spare time, I think I am going to remove the valve cover and try to visually inspect the valve seals. If I can learn something from there I will proceed to change them. My car is 200k, by the way.
The reason I just don't change them is because I am afraid I can not adjust the valves properly. I recall one experience some years ago with an old Ford F100, I ended up hiring a mechanic to make the valve adjust for me because I just couldn't make it work -I left them either too noisy or too tightened.
Power is nothing without control
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