So I was leaving work the other day and before I even made it out of the parking lot I get this strong smell of burning rubber and what sounds like a belt rubbing, I pull over open the hood and I can't see anything out of the ordinary. The smell goes away and I drive it ten minutes to home, it seems slightly sluggish but I drive it cautiously and it gets me home.

I fired it up again today and it hesitated to start but seemed to be running normally after a minute. Then I notice a large amount of white smoke coming from the exhaust, I say white smoke but I believe it was water vapor because it was condensating on the front of the car parked behind mine. There was a mild burning rubber smell again right when I turned the car on but it went away pretty quickly.

Someone suggested my head gasket might be bad, but otherwise I'm not really sure what it could be. My coolant level doesn't appear to have dropped at all, but maybe I haven't driven it long enough for that to be an issue.

I do have a small leak near the top of my gas tank, which I'm thinking could be allowing water vapor to condense inside the tank now that temperatures are dropping.

Its a 95 SE with 203k, temps today are ~55F so I don't think its normal water vapor in the exhaust.

Any ideas?

 

pressure check colling system? then go from there.

 

Look at the oil and make sure it is clear and not milky. If it is milky, you have water in the oil.

 

the burnig rubber smell makes me think drive belts.

if theres water in the tail pipe your obviously burning it but where is it coming from. hmmm...

test the pressure of the cooling system and pull the dip stick as stated above if thats all good then it may just be normal. i would think if you snapped a drive belt your car would seem to have more power.

check for rodent nests as well. they may have chewed up something and caused it to lay on your exhaust manifold/ header causing a burning smell

 

is it cold where you live? white smoke in winter is just water vapour, aka harmless. if its warm out and you get sweet smelling white exhaust, thats headgasket problems

take off the drive belt and spin your pulleys by hand, sounds to me like one of your pulleys is starting to seize up and burning up the drive belt. if that is the case, it will sooner or later burn up and break off

 

Water doesn't burn LOL!!. a combustion reaction always results in at least carbon dioxide and water... Always

If ur oil isn't milky and it doesn't smoke after warm up then I'm guessin you're leakin a bit of coolant onto a hot surface On start up only? i've done that on my ninja 250 after valve clearance check where some coolant got onto the header. belts worth a check too I guess

 

I burn water all the time. That's why my pasta tasts like crap

Sorry I didn't mean to confuse you

 

I have the same burning rubber smell at cold startup sumtimes, a few week ago my less than a year old alt belt got shredded and had to get a new one. How can u tell if a pulley is getting stuck? The crank pulley wobbles at times, only symptoms are slight hesitation during warmup.

 

Sounds like something is seizing up on you. Usually pulleys make noise before they die

Or your belt will squeal

 

Hopefully just a belt wearing down, I'm gonna bring it in and have them pressure test the coolant system. The steam might have been water that accumulated in my exhaust over the few days it was not in use (hopefully).

 

take the drive belt off and spin the pulleys by hand, you'll feel if ones starting to seize up

 

So they replaced the alternator belt, that was it. I guess I'll see if any more issues show up... The guy who did the work wasn't around when I picked it up so I couldn't ask him for any details.