What is the meaning of the smoke coming out of my vehicle?   

Our vehicles are one of our largest and worthy investments. After purchasing your vehicle, you have to make sure that you stay up to date with maintenance and repairs so that you can enjoy it for many years. However, even if you think you are up to date on service, things can still go wrong sometimes. If you are seeing smoke coming from under your hood or out of your exhaust, you might be freaking out.

No need to panic, here at Stop 23 Auto Sales in Listowel, ON, we enjoy helping our customers know everything they need to know about their car. Today, we will be sharing what it means when you see smoke coming out of your vehicle. Keep reading to learn about what the color and smell of the smoke means.

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What does the color and smell indicate?

1. White smoke. If you see white smoke coming out of the exhaust pipe, this could be sign of a head gasket issue or a failed internal engine part is burning.
2. Wispy white smoke with sweet pungent odor. If you start to see and smell this smoke, it means that a radiator hose has broken and is now spraying coolant onto the hot engine.
3. Blue or gray smoke with pungent, bitter smell. If smoke with this smell and odor is coming out of your tailpipe, this is a sign that your engine is burning oil.
4. Thick gray smoke. If you start to see this type of smoke coming from the tailpipe, it means that the transmission fluid has ended up inside of the intake manifold.
5. Black smoke with gasoline smell. If you notice this type of smoke coming out of the exhaust, it means that your vehicle is burning raw fuel. If you don’t fix this issue as soon as possible, it could damage your O2 sensor and catalytic converter.
6. Black smoke with burning plastic smell. This smoke is caused by an electrical failure or burned wires. Since there are so many wires in modern vehicles, you will see this smoke coming from under the hood or from the passenger compartment.

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Learn more about your car with Stop 23 Auto Sales

If you want to learn more about maintaining your vehicle and diagnosing any problems, keep following the Stop 23 Auto Sales blog. We enjoy helping our customers know everything that they need to know about their vehicle. After figuring out why your vehicle is smoking, feel free to schedule a service appointment today!