My year 2000 S2K recently has a faint odor of something burning under the hood.

The smell seems to be strongest in the area of the exhaust manifold and it smells very similar to the smell you get when you blow out some candles crossed with a slight burning plastic smell. It is mostly not noticeable, but sometimes you get a waft of it.

There is no evidence of any smoke, fire, or anything melting. The car runs perfectly with no CEL or other problems. There are no exhaust leaks that I can see or hear. The only problem I found was that the oil level was at the LOW mark on the dipstick. I put in one quart, and it brought it up to about the FULL mark.

Any ideas? I guess if something really is burning, it will make itself apparent soon enough heh

Brian

 

Look at your exhaust. It is quite common for a plastic bag to get stuck on the exhaust line (around the helmboltz resonator... aka the dong sticking out before the mid muffler).

Happened to me... smelled like wires burning and I got all paranoid!

 

Really good idea... that's is very much what it smells like... but I didn't' see a bag under my car... Perhaps if I put it on jackstands I can see if something is on TOP of the catalytic or something bizarre like that.

 

I'm with RWD RCKT, probably a bit of plastic road debris up into your header or exhaust somewhere.

 

Are you low on rubber? I had a similar smell when my rear tires were down to the belts. I would back into the garage and I could smell something burnt from under my car and a little bit under the hood too.

 

its been a week since you first posted it? is the smell still there? I had plastic stuck near the exhaust and it smells just like the way you described it

 

i have the same problem once, i don't know if it's a bag or not...but the burnt plastic smell was really strong for 2 weeks, then it left...Then it came back but this time very very faintly; i literally have to stick my nose on the hood to detect it...Not sure if this is normal.

 

thats weird ...cause i have the same problem but its coming around the wheel well near the driverside back tire...it smells like something is melting like plastic....i dont know what it is...but it only smells if im moving or been driving for awhile...

 

I've had that on both my cars [ AP1, but more on my AP2 because of clutch delay slave cylinder ]. For me it was just normal clutch smell. I never clutch dumped, but drove aggressively all of the time... and it stinks right in between the spokes of the rear wheels. It is like there is a designed in funnel that the smell travels there... weird...

 

Good afternoon,

I've been experiencing the same exact smell coming from the driver side after I finished driving or been driving the car for a while. Any idea on what exactly it could be?

Thanks,
Sam