355 on starting from cold.....

....throws out a small amount of coolant from the exhaust tips.

Is this a sign of head gasket leakage?

How can coolant get into the exhaust?

 

or cracked cylinder or cracked head in the worst case.
are there any air bubbles coming out of the expansion tank when engine is running?

 

Are you sure it's coolant? A major component of exhaust is water vapor. When the engine and exhaust system are cold the vapor condenses and you have water dripping out of the exhaust. Not uncommon.

 

What Johnk said. Sure it is coolant?

Every 355 tosses water out the tail pipes as it warms up. The short exhaust and condensation can make quite a mess, especially when it is cold outside.

I wonder if you could put a piece of white paper under the exhaust and see if the liquid is green (or blue or whatever color your coolant is)? Just a thought

 

Mine does this on really cold mornings, I have put paper towels on the garage floor behind the exhaust to check it. Just soot from inside the exhaust system, water vapor but it does get your mind going. So lay out about 3 feet of paper towels behind each side of the exhaust and let us know what you get.

 

Would coolant make it through a rapidly warming exhaust system all the way to the tips? Maybe steam with a blown head gasket...

Prior to having my primary cats refilled with metallic cores, my car didn't put out much in the way of moisture or condensation from the exhaust tips. It does now though until it has warmed up for around 5 minutes or so.

Hope this is the case with your car.

 

Thanks everyone

I think there is a touch of pink in the small amount of water that comes out the tips on cold startup....my antifreeze is pink.

There are no bubbles in the expansion tank when the engine is running
Temperature is perfect
Oil is perfect
Engine idles great
Engine pulls very strong all the time

Shall i get a compression test done?

 

Oh dear! Classic symptoms of a looming disaster. Perfect idle. Good oil, Pulls strong. No loss of fluids anywhere. Man this is bad bad bad.

Skip the compression test... I would pull the engine to start with. Then take the heads off to have a look.

As long as the heads are off you might as well do the valve guides and valves.

Pull a couple of pistons and sleeves...maybe you can find a crack in the block. Might as well get new rings & sleeves then too.

New headers and of course a full timing belt service with new tensions would be the thing to do at this point.

Make sure you replace the engine mounts and the water pump. Might as well pull the sump pan and check the oil pump too right?

You always wanted a new Capristo and if radiator fluid is in your old exhaust....clearly it needs to be tossed.

Or, you could change the radiator fluid to green and just drive it I guess and see what happens.

 

Sarcy...yes!
But not helpful!

 

I tried

 

While this may be actually occurring, does not sound likely to me.

First thing I would do is measure coolant level in expansion tank cold (make a mark on a stick).... and monitor the level.

If it isn't consuming coolant it can't be exiting the exhaust.

 

Actually, I would have thought that this part:

Is helpful advice!

Change the coolant to a different colour and see if the liquid exiting the exhaust changes to the same colour too - That's a cheap and easy enough way to confirm if it's coolant or not.

 

ouch, sorry to hear...out of curiosity, how many miles?

 

I think monitoring the coolant level would be easier than changing it and looking for a different color from the exhaust but that's just me

 

60,000 miles

Not too soon with the ouch

 

This can't be diagnosed on a car forum. See a professional mechanic.

 

I'll put my money on water vapor and it's pinkish because of rusty components in your exhaust.

 

Guys, the correct way to diagnose a blown head gasket is with an old school infared gas sniffer. The old Sun machine that measures HC and C0. A ton of non-Fcar shops have a sniffer.

All you do is on a cold vehicle you remove the coolant tank cap. Then you put the sniffer near the opening.

If the sniffer picks up a significant reading then you have major problems. Like a blown head gasket, cracked head, etc.

Sent by me an ASE Master Mechanic (yeah my cert was 35 years and two careers ago 😊 ) but an internal combustion engine is just that. All same principal.

 

Very true....easiest way? Put the black light dye in the coolant. Start it up and get a black light for what the liquid is? Check before you put the dye in as well.

 

I'm putting it down to rust

There is some rust further up the exhaust tips and condensation mixing with this could be pink in colour

 

That's a good call! - Didn't think of that!

(And it's a lot easier than changing all of the coolant! )

 

You mean you aren't gonna pull the engine? Damn.....

Like S-T48 said....it is probably condensation. Nothing more. R E L A X

 

Okey

Will do

 

The muffler telafuncken U47 megaphone is hans stucking

Get the picture?

 

Amazon.com: UVIEW 560000 Combustion Leak Tester: Automotive

Simple test to check if combustion gas is entering the cooling system. Doesn't tell you where it is coming from but tells you if you have a problem. $60 for peace of mind.