help!

im getting a white/grey smoke from the exhaust on cold starts... its a fresh engine and im really hoping theres no trouble there. however, when i look down the spark plug holes in the morning, there is clearly something shiny on the pistons... could this be a lot of fuel? my spark plugs also look fuel/oil fouled. i was supposed to get in for the retune today but we wanted to wait to see what was causing the smoke. can anyone take a picture of what the top of the piston should look like under normal circumstances??

the reason the tune is off is because i was at 11:1 compression with the factory engine and now im at <10:1

the smoke goes away after about 3 min of driving. but occasionally get a puff or two after decel or sitting at a light.

the oil is filled up to the H level when cold and i know that could cause a burn issue but cent see it being this bad...

 

Valve seals is the first thing that comes to mind. Leaky ones will allow oil to slowly weep into the cylinders overnight, then it will smoke when started. Will also show up under traffic light conditions sometimes as well.

 

plugs and pistons look oil soaked. Puff of smoke could also be excess fuel. On one of my cars I get a puff of smoke every time it backfires and it is fuel related. Do a sniff test to the plugs. What spark plug gap are you running, it looks really tight.

 

yeah theyre at like 14thou.... its def. rich from the tune being a little bit off... its strange cause every cylinder looks exactly the same, like this. i feel like if it were rings or valve seals it would be on some cylinders, not all. is there any way for the intake manifold to cause this?? the gasket specifically

 

Well the fact that you did a fresh start with an off tune is a huge red flag. Your tuner should have given you at least a base map to get it running properly. Depending on how far the tuner is I would not drive it long distance. If its running as rich as it looks you will wear out the rings.

 

A properly installed oem intake manifold gasket would not cause an issue, people who use the Hondata phenolic gasket/spacer can have coolant leaks.

 

so, the engine was tuned with the old setup, which was just a stock f20. the ONLY difference in these engines is a little bit of compression, 11:1 factory down to about 10:1. also, this engine isnt totally "fresh" as it does have 500 miles on it

 

Primary 02 sensor may need replacing ,dont know your miles on it ?

 

If it was just valve stem seals I'd suggest a couple products that I am using on my car right now. I add Lucas upper cylinder lubricant fuel system cleaner to the fuel - 150 ml per tank, and I just put in Liqui Moly Motor Oil Saver (once every 20k miles ) The upper cylinder lube leaves some lubrication on the intake valve stems as they enter the intake ports, may aid in sealing worn seals and reduced wear. The motor oil saver regenerates valve stem seals, it takes about 400 miles to work. I don't generally believe mehcanics in a can, but these two products seem legit and have good reputations IMO. Relatively cheap and worth a try.

 

Im having some recent smoking when under load and Im going to try these. Hope they work!