Hi all,
I'm the owner of a 1994 Honda Civic DX. Well anyhoo, I was driving to work the other day, and all of a sudden my engine started missing. Pulled up to a stop sign, and as I'm idling I look out my rear window and I notice a plume of white smoke coming from my tailpipe... I sputtered away from the stop sign and drove the rest of the way to work (I was about 2 or 3 miles away by this point) leaving a contrail of white smoke behind me...
Got there, checked the oil, and there was no unusual milky residue or anything. The coolant was low so I topped that off... after work I brought it to the nearest garage, with the same symptoms on the way (sputtering at idle, THICK cloud of smoke that, from as best I could tell was steaming antifreeze)
Haven't heard back yet, but it seems fairly obvious that it's the head gasket. Unless there's something I'm missing?
That being said, I have a couple of questions -
- Two days prior I picked up a bottle of injector cleaner and added it to my fuel. Is it possible that this somehow worsened the condition, and made it manifest itself now?
- Wouldn't there be residue in the oil if it's steaming this badly? Or is it possible that the anti-freeze is steaming and being blown out of the engine via the tailpipe without falling into the oil pan?
- Is there anything else that could cause symptoms like this, or is it pretty much guaranteed that my own assumption is correct?