advice, what to do with my 5sfe Options

[95gtschick]

not looking for more hp or anything, but here are my problems:

-start up in the morning lots of white smoke comes out of the exhaust, but never any other time.

-awful gas mileage - lucky to get 280miles to a tank

-replaced spark plugs... didn't make a difference with gas mileage, but stopped my backfiring kinda.

-noticed that a wire was spliced into one of my ignition wires, thus leaving it with a lot less resistance.

-high miles, odometer says 116k, carfax report said that january 2003 my car had 130k miles (odometer has been rolled back).

-burn a little bit of oil

I don't have an exhaust leak, i already got that fixed, i don't know what else to do. Gas mileage right now is my main concern, cause it costs me $50+ to fill up, and it barely lasts a week and a half. What would you guys do? I just want some advice. Thanks

[lagos]

a o2 sensor can cause really bad gas milage, or incorrect tire pressure....but 280miles to a tank isint that bad from what i remember getting out of my 5sfe.

[TheStreetzKing]

i have the same problem in mornings, however mine is whenever its cold, manny said its the seals or something lol

[celicast3sgte]

white smoke aka burning coolant, headgasket or possibly intake manifold.

[presure2]

see the problem is most people look at it and see white smoke, like nick.
when in reality, its light blue smoke, (oil) caused by leaking valve seals.
which is VERY common on our cars.

[Agent21]

Yeah that was my thinking. How did the plugs look when you pulled them? If they had oil on them replace tghe tube seals. If not and this worked in my car get some crc intake/fuel injector cleaner and go berzerk on the intake. Did it to my car and now today I get to clean the carbon off the bumper but it sure did help all the way around.

This post has been edited by Agent21: Sep 23, 2005 - 7:36 AM

[95gtschick]

well the idiot who owned the car before me put like, $2 spark plugs in there, so they were crappy already, but they were pretty black when i took them out, don't know if it was oil... they were just solid black. but i put in ngk iridiums, would you guys suggest replacing my spark plug wires?

[azian_advanced]

are you in Winnipeg?.. i believe there was an front page article about 10 ways to increase your gas mileage in the Free Press about a few weeks ago when gas prices went up. so if you know anybody that keeps old newspapers (i know libraries do!), then you might want to check that out.

[jess_i_74]

Hmm. I think there is a problem, since I regularly get 450+ miles out of my 5sfe.

Though I do drive it nicely.

[blu94gt]

280 isn't that bad out of a 5sfe, I get anywhere from 250-350 on mine and I drive with a heavy foot. Like said, do the easy things first like check your tire pressure

[95CelicaST]

I don't know about GT gas mileage, but I am at 300 miles at half a tank.

Does the white smoke stop once the car warms up?

I would replace the O2 sensor and check your tire pressure, I was getting bad mileage and my tire pressure was off a bunch, so I filled them all up to where they need to be and now I get great mileage.

[king_wsk]

I have a VERY heavy foot and almost do exclusive street driving and i usually see 250-290 miles while running the A/C. I once got 320miles on a trip to the valley and back doing 90mph most of the way......