White smoke from exhaust then car shuts off and won't start back up
Good morning Mr. Kilmer. I've watched a few of your videos and they've help out. I have a question though, my girl friend called me at 8 this morning saying our car died (2008 Mazda 3 5spd manual with roughly a little over 200,000mi) she said it was pourin white smoke from the exhaust and then just stopped running, the engine still cranks but acts like its out of gas. She said it never made any noises or ran differnt or showed that it was over heating. What could that issue be? Any thoughts, ideas, or insight you may have would be greatly appreciated. Thank you for your time.
See the FAQ section on troubleshooting starting problems. However the white smoke pouring out of the exhaust prior to the engine dying strongly suggests a blown head gasket.
Thanks for your feed back. Wasn't thinking it was the head gasket because each time I had a head gasket go out the car would over heat and don't remember seeing white smoke come out of the exhaust.
If coolant gets into the combustion chamber while the engine is running you'll get white smoke pouring out of the tailpipe. You may also find the spark plug for the affected cylinder(s) to be cleaner than the others due to the steam cleaning effect.