Hey guys,

Well I recently put a new engine in my camaro. It’s a 355 with 186 iron heads, I was told it’s a H-288-2 grind?, and a holley 4160 600cfm carb. The bottom end was built by a machine shop and I put the top end together myself.

Since I put the engine in it has been smoking some but I assumed at first the rings just needed to seat. The smoke was a whitish blue color so I really wasn’t sure if it was oil or coolant. After I adjusted the timing to about 18 degrees advanced the smoke seems to have gotten much worse. When the engine is cool it doesn’t smoke at all but once it warms up in about a minute or two it really starts to smoke. It also looks like there is a little water coming out of the exhaust so I am pretty sure I have either an intake manifold leak or a blown head gasket. I don’t have water in the oil, no milkshake looking oil. I put thread sealer on all the head bolts and torque everything down to spec. I tired to make sure I wasn’t running rich and adjust the idle mixture on the carb using a vacuum gauge and no matter what I changed the mixture to it the vacuum stayed at about 10 in hg.

I have an RPM air-gap manifold and I used the standard felpro intake gasket kit, the instructions say to use the edelbrock gaskets, could this be my problem?? I have already replace the intake gasket once, but I am not totally sure its not still leaking.

I appreciate any advice, I really don’t want to pull the heads off if I don’t have to..

Thanks

 

from what i know it sounds like you have a bad valve seal in your head and its burning oil but i would suggest doing a cylinder leakage test to see if it is infact a head gasket

 

If you think you have a head gasket problem you could do a block test. Should be able to get a block test kit at a auto parts store like napa, or off a tool truck. That will tell you if you have a bad head and/or gasket problem.

 

It's not the head gaskets. If you look at one, you'll notice that it's basically impossible for that to leak oil into a cylinder, without other REALLY BAD things happening at the same time. If nothing REALLY BAD is happening, then the head gaskets aren't the problem.

Advancing the timing increases the idle vacuum (makes the engine run better and more efficiently, therefore it pumps the air out of the manifold more vigorously). If that makes it smoke more, then clearly you have a connection between the crankcase (oil) and vacuum (intake) somewhere.

In 186 heads, that would be the valve guides or seals if there are any, or the intake manifold gaskets.

Water coming out the exhaust is normal; that being one of the primary products of combustion.

I would suggest taking a look at your valve guide seals.