Unfortunately, my old beast, a 1990 Camaro RS with TBI is burning oil. It's bone stock with 114k miles on it. If she sits for a while (say longer than 3 or 4 hours), she'll emit a puff of smoke on startup. The smoke is white/gray, and I know that oil typically burns blue, but I have to add a quart every 1000 miles or so, so I'm pretty sure I see oil burning up on startup. Also, infrequently while driving, it will cough out some more of that smoke on a hard acceleration or sometimes just on a normal acceleration from a long stop light. Is this bad valve seals? How urgent is the fix at an oil burning rate of about 1 qt. per 1000 miles? Also, I want to know how involved the fix will be. I'd like to get this rectified, so any help is appreciated.
(I cross-posted this in the TBI forum, so I'm sorry if the double post is frowned upon here, but I thought those would be the best two boards to post on).

 

Replacing vavle seals is very very involed, and requires opening the engine. YOur best beat is to improve the seals and clean the inside of the engine using sythenic oil. A few people have their doubts, but don't pay much attention to them. I did this recently myself and it has stopped the blue smoke on startup. The engine is running far better.

 

a quart every 1000 miles sue to accepted as normal. now with the newer engines and unleaded fuel it has become a problem to use a quart every 1000 miles. if it were me i wouldn't worry about it. if you feel the need to replace the valve seal it isn't very hard to do. you'll need an air compressor and an adapter to connect the air to your engine through the spark plug hole. you need a valve spring compressor made to change springs with the head on the engine.

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