I've recently noticed white smoke and the all too familiar hot oil smell sporatically occurring when taking the stratus on long trips and am nearing my destination...

I am thinking the valve cover gasket is prolly shot and when the engine is hot and oil pressure is high, oil is probably seaping out and hitting hot places causing the smoke... Because as soon as I shut the car off the smoke ceases and the smell disappates. I know the gasket should be changed every 30,000 miles on most cars and am fairly sure its been at least that since this was last performed (I recently acquired this car and it beginning to seem like a lot of basic maintenance was neglected)... I have already purchased a new gasket and was thinking about taking care of this today or tomorrow.

Anything special I need to know about when changing the valve cover gasket on a '99 stratus with a 2.4L 16v engine? I imagine its a fairly simple job, but I thought I should inquire with the more experienced before jumping into this job for the first time.

Thanks for the help in advance.

 

Replace the spark plug tube seals. It leaked oil into the spark plug tubes on my car and is worth replacing while you are in there.

 

If you have already done this job you probably learned that it wasnt as easy as you thought. Gasket material can take more than an hour to remove from each cover. If you have a v6, getting that back cover off will be a pain in the butt. I did mine, one day to do each side. Big mistake I made was not changing the valve guide seals at the same time. Now I am embarking on doing that in the next few weeks.

 

I did this job and it want that bad, but i'm still getting smoked out at the end of long trips.


Anyone have any ideas?

 

Dude re read my post if you are still blowing smoke. Geez whats the sense in posting if people dont read.