i'm not right in the head (of my car)

[anubis]

what's the moist black goo in my intake?

all right, here's the story. last week i decided to swap some turbo cams into my natrually aspirated 2.0 laser. it took me two very long evenings to tear down and one very long evening to put it all back together. everything was great when i drove it around town and back home. the next day i go to work and everything seems fine. on my way home from work i start puffing white/blue smoke...a lot. it smelled like i was burning oil. so i went to my friends house and we began trouble shooting. there was no oil on the spark plugs, no external oil leaks. we pulled the valve cover and didn't see anything wrong. so we took off my header and... DAMN IT! i was blowing oil into my third exhaust port. there was burnt oil all over the inside of my nice new ceramic coated header and downpipe! (the least of my concerns at this point).

time to pull the head... this sucked for too many reasons to list.

so saturday morning my friend and i pulled my head with the intake attached in about 6 hours (it comes off so fast once you know how to take off all the belts and pulleys and after all the bolts and bushings and nuts are allready broken loose). once the head was on the floor, we said enough was enough and we cleaned up and went to the dsm shootout.

when we got home early last night (cursed rain!), i finished dissasembling the head. when i pulled the intake manifold off, i saw something very strange. all of my intake ports were evenly covered in a moist black goo. the top of the intake behind the throttle body was dry, but the bottom that lines up with the intake ports had the same moist black goo. it doesn't smell like anything, it wipes right out, and there is no deposits where the injectors are spraying.

i can't take pictures because my intake and head are going to the machine shop to get tanked and rebuilt.

so my questions are: what is this moist black goo? what caused it? is it bad? where did it come from? how do i prevent it from happening again? i can only guess that it's a combination of the egr valve and maybe overspray from the injectors. my friend and i are baffled. i think the egr valve is the source of the black substance and maybe overspray from the injectors moistening it and causing it to stick to the walls of the intake ports. if i block of my egr valve, will it prevent this after i get my new head put on? also, my friend's dad said i shouldn't block off the egr valve for a daily driver because it will increase my engine/combustion temperatures too much. is he right or should i block it off?

thank you.

 

[anubis]

before i begin, let me redefine the black substance. it's not really a goo. it's not sticky and it's lumpy with a very fine granular texture. just in case anyone was wondering about it.

my head should be at the shop for the rest of the week. the guy who took it said that the moist black stuff is normal, but he didn't know what it was or where it came from. whatever the case may be, i don't want those deposits to form in my rebuilt head. it may not be bad, but i'm sure it's robbing me of performance. so please, any input is appreciated. even if you don't know for sure, let me know what you think it is. please state your level of certainty though when you're giving your 2cents.

i searched the forums here and at dsmtalk to try to find out about this stuff. if i missed them, please give me a link so i won't waste time and space here.

lastly, something i should mention about my egr block-off consideration. i drive my car 250 miles at freeway speeds or above to get to college or home from college. is this a factor in considering to block or not to block? please hyperlink if this is allready answered. i've been searching the forums for other things like turbo cams, head rebuilds , etc. i'm sick of searching

 

[rarest_90_DsM]

Is it like a powder if u touch it does it come off?

 

[Eclipsemblue]

you dont know what that is its called oil, u have something called EGR or EGT i forget exactly the correct name for it, but it is a recycler for unburned air and gases, it also likes to suck up oil when it recycle's you need this recycler to pass emmissions in most states, all that lumpy black stuff is like a combination of Oil, Carbon buildup, and gases, and some other foreign stuff . It doesnt help the car out by recycleing it back into the engine, it just saves the enviroment . I blocked mine off so it doesnt recycle that black gunk. and i just put the recycler back on when i go for inspection.

Since your cylinder was spitting out oil your EGR recycler sucked it all back into ur intake manifold and that is not good

Blocking your EGR will not make your car run hotter, if most it will make it cool down cause your releasing the shitty hot gasses, depending on what mods you have blocking off the EGR will give you bout 1-3hp gain.

P.S. that shop guy is a idiot if he doesnt know were the black goo came from, i would slap him and never take my car to him again. Do everything yourself you will save cash !!

 

[anubis]

rarest: yes it's powdery, but there is also moisture. yes it wipes off easily.

blue: i'll send you a pm. i'm not leaking oil into the cylinder, i'm leaking into my exhaust port. so i don't see how the egr would pick it up there. i do everything myself, why do you think i pulled the head. i don't have the tools, equipment, or time to tank and rebuild my head. it's the only shop left in town and they do very good work. and i personally didn't ask the guy because i didn't drop the head off. it's not like i took it to the dealership and said, "hey my car's smoking. fix it." then i'd be the idiot

 

[anubis]

so, nobody was very helpful with this issue. i still don't know what the stuff was in my intake. i'm still fairly certain it came from the egr. but none of that matters right now. i got my head machined and rebuilt. i got it all back together and my car is running ok. if anybody cares about the rest of the story, post on this thread and i'll let you know all about my overnight thrashing and my great new head. but now i'm back to school and don't have lots of time to elaborate. i'm just posting to say that my car is back together and running again. i'll be loading some picks of my new head in the near future in my profile.