highcking

The car does have a booster, integral with the MC.

I haven’t had time to look into the exhaust system. And now it’s cold. I may have my shop take a look soon.

Nat - Thanks! Does ATF smoke have an odor? How would the fluid get into a combustion chamber? Via a vacuum hose?

I’ll take care of the issue posthaste when I return home. Better than a head gasket replacement!

EmTee - thank you! That’s all new knowledge to me. I will check it out when I get home from a business trip. Bill

Final update and resolution. White smoke was water vapor from substantial water that had accumulated in the driver’s side exhaust train. This occurred over a period of month or more of variable but generally moist, cool weather during which the car was not started and heated up. My guess is that the water was in the front muffler on that side and possibly low spots in the piping. The passengers side is apparently configured so the water runs out or leaks through a tiny gap in a pipe coupling. As already noted, the combustion gas test was negative. Yesterday a long run of 30 plus minutes in temperatures in the 70s produced a lot of smoke at first and eventually none. It was warm last night, no chance for condensation. Started and ran/revved the car today and the billowing clouds were gone. Just a bit of water discharge on both sides as expected. I expect that in the future I’ll get water vapor again if weather conditions are right and the car sits for weeks at a time. I dodged a very unpleasant bullet. I’ve been around cars for some 55 years and have experienced two head gasket failures, one a previous 58 Buick! But I never encountered this “Steam” phenomenon. Thanks to all who contributed ideas and suggestions. Bill Shields

I plan on that drive as soon as the cursed leaking master cylinder has been replaced!

Bob - thanks, will do. I tested all the cylinders myself soon after I got the car about 100 years ago, it seems. I have the readings in a file somewhere. All were significantly down from a nominal 180 but their were no extremely low readings. I doubt this engine has ever been touched other than minor reports and tuneups. I’ll report what the shop finds.

EmTee - I looked at two plugs on the drivers side and they looked normal to me. The two rear plugs on that side are extremely difficult to pull out and replace. I’m taking the car to a shop soon for unrelated work and I plan to ask for a compression test on all cylinders.

Marty - no crossover on this model. Separate front to back.

Both possible … but they would cause smoke from both exhaust pipes. Everything is discharging from the drivers side only.

60FlatTop, New tool? Alas, I have an essentially brand new Stant test kit bought as Hershey a decade or two ago. I plan to use it along with Bob’s suggestion of the CO2 detector. In that case, I did have to buy a new tool. Now that I’m 72, I wonder where all these tools will end up.

Morgan - I live on a farm and mice do that kind of thing! Last year they built a big nest inside my pressure washer preheater. And recently I found a mouse nest inside the air cleaner of my Ram hemi engine. Buick has a muffler and two resonators on each side. I’ll explore that possibility.

Yes, that puzzled me at first. But it didn’t stop for long. Eventually it ran for 25 minutes steady, smoking on the drivers side only. Has to be coolant getting into a cylinder and vaporizing. I don’t see any sign that the oil is diluted. Or block damage …

My Buick's master cylinder came with a threaded steel plug where the brake light switch installs. I forgot to install the switch before I installed the master cylinder so I had to do it with fluid in the cylinder. I purchased a “Standard” brand in the box from an eBay vendor. I followed some online advice to prevent air getting into the system and this worked like a charm. I filled the switch with brake fluid, wrapped the threads in Teflon, and did the quick swap. A very small amount of fluid dripped into the shop rag. Now I come to my question. I was wearing rubber gloves and quickly turned the switch in with my fingers. After a few seconds of turning (maybe 3-4 full turns, I didn’t count) I suddenly realized the switch housing was turning but not the threaded piece. I stopped immediately, cleaned up the dripped fluid and ran a few tests. It’s not leaking even after depressing the brake pedal (engine off) 10 or so times. The switch itself works just as it should. I haven’t done one of these switches in a long time. Opinions on what happened? Defective switch from China? I can’t locate any specific directions on how to actually install the switch. Thoughts welcome. Note that the picture is generic - ignore the numbers. Bill in Virginia