smoky petrol

[lozz]

ye sounds like stem oil seals
my vectra had same problem thats why i got shut of it
they wanted about £500 to change them. all labour stripping engine down

£500
was that a main stealer price ?
can get heads rebuilt for under £120.

[lozz]

My Ford Orion drank oil and put out blue smoke. Turned out to be seals.
Didn't fix, ended up running on 3 cylinders.
Must be a Ford thing. That was an early Zetec (Zeta I think?)

Lol, ford got done for using the word Zeta ,
hence why they changed it to zetec iirc ithink there /theres engines wouid of ran better if they remained Zeta

The engines named Zeta belongs to lancia

[sirwiggum]

The engines would have ran better if they had been called HDi.

When it ran properly. the 1.8 16v Zeta had a great power delivery, but the fact it was so unreliable put me off for good.

[Bailes1992]

ST170 is just a 2.0 Litre Zetec engine with a sexy head and a rasied rev limiter.
Ford weak points are valve stems. Mine are abit worn too, it uses oil on startup thats it. Most oil I've gone through is 0.8litres in 1000miles. I wouldn't worry.
If it's the rings it would smoke blue a little all the time and lots when you put your foot back on the loud pedal after overun.
Again, my Focus smokes white. It's a sign of water, I gather the car does lots of small journeys?
Best you can do is change the oil and water. Take it for a bloody long motorway run (50miles each way) then while the engines warm go and have a play on some nice roads. Get it nice and toasty! Lots of revs (it should rev to 7750iirc?). It has VCT so you should hear the engine note changing throughout the revs as the timing is adjusted. After a good thrash take it home and while it's still hot drop the oil and coolant and do another change.
It should use 5w30 Fully Synth. I use 5w30 Semi Synth which is fine. I can change my oil for ~£30. Carlube 5w30 oil is perfect and is stamped by Ford, I pay £19.99 for 5 litres. Ford is around £7 for a filter and a new sump plug(you cant just change the washer). Change it every 6 months or 6k
Chances are if its done short journeys water is building up around the engine and exhaust, higher up in the revs the engine is getting hotter and it's burning off the water. Thus the white smoke! Just do what I said and it should fix it
If you want piece of mind get a compression test done
Ford have a tool which allow you to change the valve stems with the cams and valves still in place. So dosen't require a strip down.

How many miles / age is it?

Reason I suggest this method is over the years slight wear would have been caused to the engine. Dirt in the oils may be taking up gaps in certain places (i.e. shells, cam lobes etc). There may even be packed dirt on the cylinder walls or may be stopping leaks etc. Often flushes dislodge this dirt and you may get compression losses, leaks, knocking, tapping etc. The method I use cleans as much as the old oil out as possible without dislodging any friendly dirt
I know with ST220's which are chain driven has it's own oil feed to the timing chain. Often these engines are flushed which blocks up the oil feed to the timing chain which causes it to seize and snap.

Anywho I could go on forever. Simple thing is if you look after a Zetec engine it will last! regular oil changes and a long blast here and there will do it wonders!

[no2lurch]

Thanks for that. I'll get busy- lift off oversteer here I come!

[omega]

Thanks for that. I'll get busy- lift off oversteer here I come!

hello its lurch
can you come and pick me up?

why? where are you?

in the ditch on the a5

[Welly]

There's a hole in my engine Dear Bailesey, Dear Bailesey there's a hole in my engine Dear Bailesey, a Hole.

Then mend it Dear Lurchy, Dear Lurchy, Dear Lurchy, then mend it Dear Lurchy, Dear Lurchy mend it.

With what shall I mend it Dear Bailesey, Dear Bailesey with what shall I mend it Dear Bailesey with what?

Some glue and some paper Dear Lurchy, Dear Lurchy, Some glue and some paper Dear Lurchy, some glue.

[Bailes1992]

There's a hole in my engine Dear Bailesey, Dear Bailesey there's a hole in my engine Dear Bailesey, a Hole.

Then mend it Dear Lurchy, Dear Lurchy, Dear Lurchy, then mend it Dear Lurchy, Dear Lurchy mend it.

With what shall I mend it Dear Bailesey, Dear Bailesey with what shall I mend it Dear Bailesey with what?

Some glue and some paper Dear Lurchy, Dear Lurchy, Some glue and some paper Dear Lurchy, some glue.

More likely to throw a rod at low RPMs than you are at the limiter

[steve_earwig]

How does that work then?

[Bailes1992]

How does that work then?

Well say a cars weight is 1.5tones.
That 1.5 tonees is pulled along by the engine. The 1.5 tonnes being split between the conrods in terms of pressure exerted on them. At higher revs that 1.5 tonnes is being shared out more so the conrods are effectivley under less stress although moving faster. So high RPMS will throw a rod but thats what the limiter is there for. If you labour an engine that 1.5 toness is put on the conrods at an even higher mass! DT's never throw there conrods at high RPM's. Usually they go when your generally driving about as thats when the most stress is put on the bottom end. Going up a hill at low rpms etc.

Basically the force to pull the car is more shared out between the conrods at high RPM's than low.

And just to pluck up lurches confidence. The Focus RS also uses a Zetec 2.0 engine. When Ford was designing the engine they used to standard bottom end for tests and it was running fine with 350bhp on it!

[Welly]

All the engines I've seen blow up (down at 'The Pod') have shattered to bits a high rpm's - I put it down to being subjected to 'more' of everything but I do get your theory about labouring as the crank/rods do indeed have the whole car's weight behind them.... a bit like trying to ride up-hill in gear 21 on yer bike

[steve_earwig]

All the engines I've seen blow up (down at 'The Pod') have shattered to bits a high rpm's

Exactly, when the piston changes direction at the top and bottom of the stroke the acceleration is into thousands of Gs. The weight of a car is nothing compared to the weight of, say, a couple of elephants.

And that's without the weight of the car.

I was once told by a guy who made racing engines that in his experience the most likely time for a con rod to let go is coming off the pedal from full revs.

[Bailes1992]

Yeh but those cars at the pod are hightunes and have far finer tolerances than our engines do