My friend borrowed my 95 legacy 2.2 and drove it work (35 mile freeway). Car ran fine. Pulling off the freeway as she's coming to the light the car dies and "massive amounts of white smoke" come up from the hood. Coasting, she makes it to the breakdown lane and tries to restart it. Nothing but a click, lights and radio work fine.

 

I arrive an hour later, and here's what I find:

Oil stain about the area of a piece of paper under the cylinder 1 area. Several small drip spots mostly along the front of the engine. Radiator & cap are still warm to the touch (temp gauge 1/3 up from bottom). Overflow tank full to about 1" from the top of the tank. Carefully opening the radiator cap, I see no fluid in the radiator neck. I squeeze the top radiator tube and it feels empty. I fill/burp/fill/burp the radiator with about a pint or two of distilled water.

 

The dipstick is covered in oil several inches above the full mark. After wiping and rechecking the oil level is between the marks.

 

From what I could see, everything (hoses/tubes/wires) seems correct. The underside of the motor is slick with oil, but because it has had a slight oil leak for months, it doesn't look too much worse than usual, if only a bit fresher.

 

I start the car, and drive it about 2 blocks to a better spot and have lunch. After lunch, I check it over again. Now the overflow tank has sucked back in all the coolant to about 1/2" under the full-line.

 

I proceed to drive cautiously the 35 freeway miles home. Car seems to run fine. Temp is just a hair under 1/2 on the gauge.

 

What happened? Over heated? Too much engine oil? Something else?

 

(Background on the car: Has had an oil leak for many many months, needs about a quart every 6 weeks or so. Friend checked the oil on Thursday, after a CEL was thrown, and added 2 quarts.)

Well the ECM has no way to tell what the oil level is, and the CEL does not illuminate for anything non-emissions related, such as the oil level.

 

Large amounts of white smoke I would imagine was all the oil that puked out of the engine, maybe from being overfilled?

Missing coolant, means you have a leak or it overheated and boiled out while driving. Check around the thermostat housing for green/ brownish green sludge.

Maybe the water pump is losing efficiency.

 

I helped 'TheLoyale' (Tom) find a 500 dollar legact in the alley in my neighborhood, and tried to add coolant. The seller said the water pump leaked. We tried for over an hour to bleed the air out of it, and after we think it was full, it would get warm, thinking the thermostat would open and the rad would get warrm. The rad stayed cool for the most part, while the upper hose was hot.

 

The next day, we drove it the 5 blocks back to my place. The water pump seized and took out the timing belt. We put on a used pump and belt, and tom drove it home that day.

 

How many miles on this car?

I would replace the rad cap if you find no other leaks as suggested.

 

Probably overheated serverly and she did not notice the temp gauge

 

when the engine overheats the ecu will cut power it is very possible it will shut off completely and not run for a bit atleast till you got there and it cooled down.

Overheated.

 

Make sure the cooling fan works.

Yeah my thought was it overheated as well. I think the rad cap is bad, along with quite a few other things. Thanks for the confirmation! I've never seen an overheat puke oil before so I wanted to make sure I wasn't missing something obvious.

Well lets go with overheat for now. I would replace the thermostat, and just because it is cheap the radiaotr cap. It is always a good idea to change the oil after an overheat, since that gets overheated too, just takes longer.

Check the coolant for hydrocarbons and do a pressure leakdown test on the radiator. In the meantime, I would change the oil, rad cap, t-stat and coolant.

I would replace the rad cap if you find no other leaks as suggested.

 

Probably overheated serverly and she did not notice the temp gauge

 

when the engine overheats the ecu will cut power it is very possible it will shut off completely and not run for a bit atleast till you got there and it cooled down.

I'm pretty sure subaru didn't use that strategy on the older ECU's. I know other manufacturers do, it can be a real downer when you're killing a car off in the woods, but I've never had a subaru do that.

 

92 ecu's for sure don't, I've had them cooking and while the engine was loosing power, it wasn't because the ECU was cutting back fueling or timing.

 

Had a 97 with a completly blocked lower radiator hose (they left the plastic transportation plug in the thermostat housing when they swapped the salvage engine in). It would understandably overheat, and the ECU never backed off.

 

With the starter just going "click" when she tried to crank it, and the engine stalling on it's own, I'd say she heat seized it. The massive cloud of white smoke had been following her down the freeway for a ways, and she just didn't notice it until she slowed down and it caught up with the car. If you're lucky, the starter was overheated enough not to work, but chances are the pistons were swelled enough to lock in the cylinder bores. That leads to intense scoring of the cylinder walls. A compression test would be a good first check on the engine's condition.

 

Is this an automatic transmission car? White smoke can also be transmission flluid boiling out. Check the trans level (the dipstick by the brake booster) with the engine idling in park. Sniff the fluid to see if it smells like burnt celery, or looks black/grey. It should be bright pink-reddish. In a severe engine overheat, the transmission will overheat too because it depends on it's cooler in the radiator to dump heat.

 

The engine oil being high on the dipstick but showing normal when wiped and checked is normal.

Like others have said, I too think the white smoke is from over heating. You stated that your oil dip stick showed the motor was not low on oil, so I don't think there is an oil issue connected to this break down.

 

It is possible that you may have a blown head gasket. The 2.2 motor is not prone to do this, but I did have a 1991 with the 2.2 motor that blew a head gasket, so it is something to be aware of.

 

At this point, turn the key to see if it will turn over and start. If so, suggest changing the thermostat and rad cap like others have said. If motor runs okay, take only trips close to home, and constantly watch the temp gauge for over heating.

 

When my 2.2 blew a head gasket, it would take about 10 minutes of driving from a stone cold condition to see the temp gauge start climbing in a hurry to HOT.

I'm going to tear it down as far as the timing belt and see if I can figure where the oil leak is, then I'll replace all the fluids and radiator cap & thermostat.

 

If it heat seized, wouldn't it smoke a lot when driving as oil made it past the rings? When I drove it home (35 miles on the freeway) everything seemed ok. The temp gauge stayed just under the halfway mark and my wife, who was following me, said everything looked normal from her perspective: no smoke, no leaks, no smell.

One would think so.Despite that,IMO,that is the reason it would not crank over.

I'm going to tear it down as far as the timing belt and see if I can figure where the oil leak is, then I'll replace all the fluids and radiator cap & thermostat.

 

If it heat seized, wouldn't it smoke a lot when driving as oil made it past the rings? When I drove it home (35 miles on the freeway) everything seemed ok. The temp gauge stayed just under the halfway mark and my wife, who was following me, said everything looked normal from her perspective: no smoke, no leaks, no smell.

Watch your oil consumption and replace your PCV valve. Heat seize is not the same as a low oil seize, sometimes you get lucky.

i think i'd check all the fluids and keep them filled, and just drive it. if bearing or crank damage has been done more labor and parts probably are a waste. if you can't drive it even with oil and coolant then it's done. but if keeping it full of oil and coolant means you can drive it , drive on. the oil leak, if there is one, will surface eventually.

 

EJ22s can take a lot of abuse.

I wouldn't bother tearing anything down, esp to fix a low-level oil leak. If the oil level wasn't low at the time of the overheat, it's not a contributor to the problem so don't waste time trying to fix it.

 

Spend your time trying to find out why the cooling system malfunctioned. Bad aftermarket thermostat? Use a dealer one. Blocked radiator? Collapsed hose? Bad fan relay, fuse, or motor? Turn on the A/C and see if both fans come up to full speed.

 

Do check the auto trans fluid, it takes a severe beating when the engine overheats and it's easy to change to save the transmission from more damage.

I'd say you had a massive HG blowout, major loss of oil and coolant.

I'd say you had a massive HG blowout, major loss of oil and coolant.

 

(ssshhhh we don't want to scare him yet)

Nobody has mentioned it yet.....a major leak of coolant could come from a split radiator hose. It is worth a few minutes of your time to inspect the hoses for damage.

I drained the coolant, and it looked like black tea. Not milky, or foamy but dark dark brown. Does that mean the exhaust was leaking into the coolant? There were no bubbles in the overflow tank.

 

 

The top radiator hose port also crumbles away with very little force applied. I can break it up like a cookie. Is this from age, or heat?

 

I'm pulling the motor to fix the oil leak (looks like it's a cam seal), and replace the timing belt, as well as do the head gaskets while I'm there. I'm assuming if I'm going that far, I'll do the water pump, thermostat, and accessory belts as well. Anything else I should be on the lookout for?

 

I can do all the work myself, and as I can't afford to replace the car I need to make it reliable.

Head gasket. remove the radiator and flush that out first, as that gunk when it hits the air can clog the Rad.

 

Do a compression test 1st. This will tell you if there is any internal damage. Do a wet and dry test. This will check to see if the piston walls are scored.

 

Heads will have to go to a machine shop to be checked for flatness and have the surface finish restored.

Ironically I just finished doing head gaskets on a 2.2 last week. But that motor had a hundred thousand more miles on it. at least the machine shop will be happy to see me again

 

Thanks for all your help.

Ive seen this several times: hose blows and coolant runs out.... person keeps driving car ( not looking at temp gauge) HOT. Engine gets so hot that it stalls and white smoke etc. The knock sensor and pass side plastics melt down and every thing is toast. cylinders are overheated heads are possibly cracked. best solution get a new 2.2 and put new upper and lower hoses on it... least amount of time and $ involved.

The top radiator hose port also crumbles away with very little force applied. I can break it up like a cookie. Is this from age, or heat?

A little of both, but mostly heat. See this kind of thing on 04 - 08 Saab 9-3s. The coolant reservoir is plastic, and is very close to the turbo. To add to that the turbo coolant outlet drains directly to the reservoir. With regular use the heat causes the plastic to brittle and pretty much fall apart, leading to a substantial leak. Under heavy driving the hoses will blow off of the reservoir and spray coolant all over the engine bay. Saab recalled them and replaces them with brass reservoirs.

 

If the engine got cooked that bad, I'd expect there to be other problems soon. Excessive ring/cylinder wear causing low compression. Bearing wear would mean certain death. The block or heads could be cracked or on the verge of cracking.