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Thread: Catalytic Converter puffing when engine off? 540i

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Feb 2004
    Posts
    4,894

    Default Catalytic Converter puffing when engine off? 540i

    Wierd thing is happening... First the car is smoking alot... now engine is harder to crank which almost sounds like bad battery... and now the exhaust is puffing when engine is off.

    LOL... it is funny... We came home from shopping... parked the car because I know I can't get the car started on it's own withiout a jumpstart battery pack. Even with the booster... engine still crank over slowly.

    The point is car is parked... and we were waiting in other car and saw the exhaust puffing occasionally. A good plume of white smoke come out once a while... reminds me of Puff the Magic Dragon...

    So what do you think? Think I got a leaky injector or maybe a bad coil that inject rich fuel mixture to my cats thereby plugging it up... causing resistance that the engine have hard time starting?

    No check engine light at all.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Dec 2003
    Location
    PA
    Posts
    5,403

    Default

    white smoke = coolant = headgasket.

    sticking injector will be like a hickup, car should still run, i doubt you'd see it but a too rich condition would be black smoke but you've got a cat so it'd be real faint.

    oil burns blue and probably wouldn't burn bad enough to REALLY tell at idle unless your rings/valve seals are really forked.

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Jan 2004
    Posts
    4,150

    Default I'd guess you were right Stan, i would pull all the plugs and try to

    determine which one is wet like a stuck open injector filling up a cylinder... and if the cat is hot and some of the fuel vapors are getting to it then you'll see the puffs that your talking about but the cat is going to be blazing hot also. And its not that the cat gets plugged up, its that it melts down and fuses together causing a plug or blocked passages.


    Quote Originally Posted by Tiger
    Wierd thing is happening... First the car is smoking alot... now engine is harder to crank which almost sounds like bad battery... and now the exhaust is puffing when engine is off.

    LOL... it is funny... We came home from shopping... parked the car because I know I can't get the car started on it's own withiout a jumpstart battery pack. Even with the booster... engine still crank over slowly.

    The point is car is parked... and we were waiting in other car and saw the exhaust puffing occasionally. A good plume of white smoke come out once a while... reminds me of Puff the Magic Dragon...

    So what do you think? Think I got a leaky injector or maybe a bad coil that inject rich fuel mixture to my cats thereby plugging it up... causing resistance that the engine have hard time starting?

    No check engine light at all.


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