keantoken

Hi everyone. Our 96 Corsica has been sitting around for a year or two since it started blowing smoke.

I just replaced the starter and the fuel pump and it runs like it did before. The smoke appears white, and no one seems to be able to tell whether it's white smoke or blue smoke.

I feel pulses of air and hear rumbling when I open the oil cap. Smoke also comes out of there. Smoke would also come out of the exhaust manifold until I replaced a few vacuum hoses.

I discovered the coolant temperature sensor was dead, preventing the radiator fan from coming on. I don't know what the thermostat temperature for this car is supposed to be but it seems to open at around 180-190F. Even at 90F+ ambient temperature the radiator fan never comes on when idling, so I wonder if the thermostat is opening early.

We went for a test drive and the car had plenty of power, sounded okay but when we tried to go to 55MPH there was a loss of horsepower and it struggled over the hills to go back home.

Here are the results of some cylinder compression tests I did:

I think I put too much oil in 3 while testing. I probably used more oil than necessary in every case, so I wonder if that could falsely raise the wet compression reading.

I think a piston ring change would be beyond my means, but I think I could change the head gasket. The problem is I'm not sure what would be the right gasket for this engine. It is the L82, but I don't know how to tell whether it is the "2nd design" or not.

I will appreciate any help and advice.