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When the car gets hot, I start to hear bearing noise. Coolant seems to be dissapearing slowly. White smoke out the exhaust when cold. Clears up when hot. I have a feeling that exhaust gasses are getting into the oil creating a high oil temp condition. I had 500 Miles on Penzoil 30w. I just changed it and is smells a bit burned and is very black. I dont want to start tearing everyghing down without proper testing. What else can I look for?
When the car gets hot, I start to hear bearing noise.
If you can actually hear a bearing noise the bearings are too far gone for anything but replacement to fix.
A head gasket can leak in four ways:
1: combustions to coolant (most common) You will get white smoke and lose coolant. A leak down test and a cooling system pressure test will verify this condition.
2: Combustion to oil (very rare, as the path is long) You will get exessive blow by. Oil will discolor and smell bad. (same symtoms as a burnt piston)
3: water to oil (more common with intake gasket but will occur on head gaskets) oil will get milky very quickly.
4: compustion to combustion. Head gasket will fail between two cylinders. You will get popping back through carb and exhaust.
The fisrt thing I would do is a leakdown test and a cooling system pressure test.
EZ way first...Take off radiator cap, look for foam and chocolate milk...next chage the oil in a clean pan. Water is in the radiator or oil pan or both.