alrighty, i've no oil in turbo or exhaust/ex ports in head, not using water, however i'm getting a fuel smelling smoke from the exhaust.
it was worse after i tinkered with the cam timing the other week, so i fitted adjustable pulleys to make it easier to swing the cams when i need to instead of pulling rocker cover off and dial gauge out, can be worked on a set of rollers easily then.
so i re-timed the cams as best as i could with dial gauge working on overlap lift as directed by Ian Howell and it has got better.
although the smoke is still there, can valve timing being out cause smoke problems?
perhaps the exhaust is scavenging fresh fuel when inlet and exhaust ports are briefly open.

any help appreciated, it's doing my head in now, i doubt it's rings, engine has only done 2.7k.

cheers
sean

 

If your timing is out far enough the fuel isn't burning completley, then you'll end up with a greyish smoke out the tail pipe

 

i haven't really thought of ignition timing as an issue, i need to get a timing light on that i think, just to check the offset as it's been a while since i've done anything in that respect.

 

i've had another thought, the pipe to the catch tank had a kink in it, this could be stopping the bottom end breathing properly, i'll check that too.

 

kink in the breather pipe? could easily cause a bit of smoke. try that.

 

i would look at the kink defo and is your turbo oil drain to the sump ok eg no kink or level as when my engine was on the dyno it was smoking really bad then harvey realised the oil drain pipe was sitting level , moved it and it was fine

cheers paul

 

oil return pipe should be fine, it sit's in the alloy top part of the two part sump, above the splash shield and runs directly from turbo down a 15mm pipe into a 90 degree bend into the sump. although could be a benefit to have this moved up, but pretty high anyways.
i'll check and replace the breather pipe

 

What turbo you running? If its a gt series make sure you have a restrictor in turbo to oil feed pipe. I was told by vince @cr that can cause smoke.

 

turbo is shite, i did have a ball bearing turbonetics one till the seal went in that, so bought a new cheapo t3/t4, well i only paid £60 for it so hey ho.
it's a bit annoying as it's been fine since i fitted it, but started getting smokey a few weeks back, i though it could have been stems or bottom end thinking the worst, so today i forced open the external wastegate (after swinging cams and ignition timing all over the place) and the gas stream was clear as you like, the smoke was very feint grey and cleared quickly hence me thinking fuel issue.
happy in some respects as bottom end should have been good for a long time and was a cheap turbo, thought it would last longer, i don't suppose forcing 26psi out of it has helped matters at all.
onwards and upwards lol!
p.s. i'm skint too