I just picked up an 86 300ZX turbo today. The body and interior are in great shape. It had been sitting for about a year. I picked up some fuel treatment and fresh 93 octane and got it to turn over but no start. So I give it full throttle and it starts and runs. Well I wouldn't say runs, at WOT I wouldn't even consider it an idle. It spits, sputters then after a few seconds puffs a small cloud of smoke from down near the turbo and slowly dies out. The whole time it's also smoking out the tail pipe like a chimney. At first I thought blown turbo but the smoke has a gas smell and not an oil smell. Even the smoke under the hood has no scent of oil. It will do this each time. The motor sounds like it may be building up a bit of steam then 'putt' from under the hood and it kills it. Any ideas? I know this is kinda of a tough call without being able to see it or anything but I'd appreciate any input. If worse comes to worse I can make a small video clip of what it's doing. Thanks in advance, Ian

 

Do you know it was running okay when it was parked?

You may have some really skunky gas that will require draining the tank. Sorry, all the crap and moisture goes to the bottom of the tank where the pick up is located. All that new gas is sitting on top of the water, nowhere near the pick up.

You might check the ECU codes for a clue or two.

Parked for a year means some mice may have decided to nest and used your wires as something to chew on until the cat left the scene. Check all the wires.

 

The guy said the car was running when it was parked. The check engine light isn't coming on and the wires all look good (although there are a couple vacuum hoses loose that I have no idea about.)

 

Well good news I finally got around to checking all the simple stuff and I found the main problem with the 300. I was checking spark and pulled the number 2 plug to do so. When I got it out the contact was broken in half and the elctrode was completely melted out. There is also alot of oil on the plug but I'm hoping most of that is seeping down from my very leaky valve cover gaskets. I'll update when I get new plugs in it.