If your car is hissing, popping, or tapping when you start it, you have a leak in the exhaust manifold or a leaking exhaust manifold gasket. The manifold or gasket can crack if your engine is running too hot. They can also crack when they are old because they put up with a tremendous amount of heat and pressure while they process the engine’s exhaust. Aside from the strange noises at start-up, here are other signs that you have a crack in the exhaust manifold or a cracked gasket.
Rotten Performance
The exhaust is removed from the combustion chamber so that the chamber can continue to produce combustion. The chamber struggles to produce combustion if it is filled with exhaust. Unfortunately, when the manifold or gasket is leaking, the engine fills with exhaust. This makes producing combustion difficult and you will notice a reduction in your engine’s performance.
Rotten Fuel Efficiency
You will also notice a reduction in your vehicle’s fuel efficiency. The engine will consume more fuel as it struggles to produce power while the exhaust fills the combustion chamber. Unfortunately, this can make things difficult if you are living on a tight budget. You will need to fill the tank more often to keep gasoline or diesel fuel in your automobile.
Strong Rancid Odors
As we have mentioned, the leaking exhaust can fill the engine. As we also mentioned, the exhaust is extremely hot. Unfortunately, it will overheat the engine parts and start to melt the parts that are susceptible to excess heat. As such, you will smell strong rancid odors coming from the engine. In addition, the engine may overheat.
Strong Exhaust Odors
As if the rancid odors were not bad enough, you may also start to smell your vehicle’s exhaust inside of your car, truck, or utility vehicle. Consequently, it may become dangerous to operate the automobile. You cannot drive while you are inhaling exhaust because the exhaust will make you sick. It’s better to pull over and call for a tow truck.
Check Engine Warning
Finally, system sensors throughout the engine will alert the engine control unit that there are things going wrong. Unfortunately, this means that you will end up with an illuminated check engine warning on your dashboard until you have the manifold or gasket replaced.
We can do that here at our shop, so call us today to schedule a service visit. We can inspect the manifold and gasket to see if they are cracked. We can also repair the problem.
