railmule

hey all.... just got done with a heads, cam, ls6 intake install on my Camaro... Car has not been tuned yet and is running pretty rough,,, upon start-up I get a good puff of smoke out of the exhaust and when it sits there and idles for a while the smoke gets worse not super bad but deff smoke.... the smoke does not smell of antifreeze its got more of a oil fuel smell... the heads were ported and i put RTV on the intake rocker bolts and may have put too much on them,, could it be the RTV burning off...... car has about 30min of idle time since the install and is still puffing smoke..... car go to tuner mon and would like to get it right before it goes.. . and let me add when heads were done new valve seals were used.. thanks.

SS10Tech

Depends on what cam was used. You're sure the valve seals were installed correctly? Your stock timing events as well as fuel/air values are nowhere near optimal for a full heads/intake/cam especially if the cam is a dramatic change.

Pull the plugs and read them - you could be washing out the plugs by dumping too much fuel. If they are soaked in oil then something is up.

railmule

hey... thanks for reply... the cam is 227 235 111lsa over 600 lift... pulled the passenger side plugs,,, they all look good not oil soaked, or fuel soaked... look pretty good.... im hoping the cam has just got everything out of wack.... guess i will see wait and see what tuner says...

car is throwing a p0300 code multiple cylinder misfire... i believe it is the cam doing this....

heads came preassembled from a professional porter,, so i assume the valve seals are right..

SS10Tech

If the plugs arent getting soaked and there isnt any oil i'd check to make sure all cylinders are getting ignition. If that checks out then i would wait until you trailer it to the tuner. Not much else you can say until you attempt to get it tuned for your new HCI swap.

2000PewterT/A

Has the car been tuned, if not its probably running pig rich right now.

railmule

No not tuned yet. To the tuner mon.

railmule

Well got car tuned today. It made 396hp ran better than I expected. But it is for sure burning oil,,,, Going to first try to pull the rocker bolts out and reseal the intake bolts and see if that helps out and if that don't guess I will have to pull springs and put new valve seals in,,, damn.

railmule

well resealed intake rocker bolts,,,,,, still getting oil smoke at idle mainly after the car gets good and warm.... what do you all think is the issue?? valve seals? valve guides? any help thanks...

LilJayV10

iTrader: (39)

Where the heads that you put on new? I ran into the same problem after my H/C/I/E swap. The used heads that I bought that were suppose to be in good shape had bad valve guides.

railmule

yea mine were a 243 casting bought used... i never saw them till the port work was done.... im kinda leaning toward the guides being bad... how did you car act when it had the bad guides in it??

cujo18

My car smoked to without a tune. But after it got tuned it stopped smoking.

railmule

yea was hoping mine would clear up after a tune but not so lucky... still smoking... talked to porter that did heads and said all valve guide checked out good and all valve guides were replaced...


guess i will pull the plugs and see what cylinders are burning the oil and replace the valve seals on that cylinder and see if that fixes it.... damn what a bitch..

chawin

I am in the same boat. You can see in my signature what I did but I have smoke too. Brought my car to one of the best LS tuners in the state even surrounding states but it is still running pig rich and plan on bringing it back for a re tune because it is quite obvious how rich it is running. I have yet to pull my plugs but mine smokes pretty good too. Didnt smoke before the swap, side walls and everything looked great. Some day I will confirm with a compression test and leak down but didnt smoke before the swap. I have 243 heads that Lingenfelter ported and did valve seats bla bla but I get some good smoke. I have a feeling one of my valve seals is out. I get a puff on start up after its been sitting so I know a seal is leaking but I have a hard time believing that a valve seal is letting so much by that it puts out a constant smoke at idle and even driving. So im a little confused. Not stealing your thread just throwing my ideas out there that if I were you I would start with valve seals. They have little itty bitty springs that if pinched in the wrong way will make for a falulty seal!

railmule

hey man... sounds just like mine... im gonna pull my plugs and hope i can find one that is oil soaked and if i do im just gonna replace the intake and exhaust on that cly... i wish someone would chime in on how bad a car will smoke if it has 1-2 bad valve seals... did you seal your intake rocker bolts??

chawin

Hey, Let me know what you find. I have unfortunately been too busy lately to pull my plugs yet. Curious what you have found so far. I am also curious how bad a car could really smoke with a bad valve seal or two or three etc. I did not seal my intake rocker bolts... I guess Ive never heard of that until now but makes sense since the threads go all the way into the port.

railmule

Will keep updated. When you do pull the rockers I would for sure seal the intake bolts with hi temp silicone or arp thread sealant. I'm gonna put a few more miles on car before I rip it apart again,, to make sure the plug or plugs are good and oil soaked.

railmule

one bad valve seal making all the smoke...

pulled plugs and you can see very easy what clyinder were the bad seal was.. hope this helps..

poltergeist 02

iTrader: (65)

Thats great that you found the problem. I would put the new seal in and get it back up on the dyno.

railmule

Yea I'm gonna get back in dyno,, it's running rich the tuner was having probs getting the tune dead on due to the oil contamination,, so looks like he let it run rich to be on the safe side of the tune.

chawin

So after you fixed that seal all is well since?