97 Ranger 4-cyl breaks down on highway - major white smoke from under the hood

[Bill_M]

Hi. I have a 97 Ford Ranger / 2.3L / 4 cylinder (L4) / 5 speed manual / XL Supercab 4x2 / 140k miles.

BACKGROUND:

I had been having some Check Engine issues and ran rough in town stop light to stop light. But was fine on the highway.

On several visits to the parts store, their OBD tester showed:
PO303 (Cyl 3 misfire detected)
PO141 Bank 1 Sensor 2 O2 Sensor (heater circuit malfunction)
PO171 Bank 1 Combustion Too Lean (the most recent new code to show up)

And the following would show up sometimes, but other times not:
PO 402 EGR Flow - Excessive Detected
P1409 EVR (I don't recall the exact error message)

Regards the PO141 code, O'Reilly's sold me a Bosch O2 Sensor (Bosch 15719) and the sales rep told me it was the sensor closer to the engine. And with the attached cable length on the sensor showed was indeed the sensor closest to the engine. But I've been advised the Sensor 2 is for the 'downstream' sensor, furthest away from the engine. And the other sensor, that I replaced is the upstream sensor. And the error continued.

Then back issues showed up and I had back surgery this past year and thus drove the vehicle sparingly. Never resolving the check engine issues. (My bad).

Ran on the highway ran fairly well. But recently noticed longer acceleration times and unable to top 65 in 5th gear.

I bought spark plugs and plug wires and had plans to change next week.

ISSUE:

Yesterday as driving down the Interstate, was 90 miles into my trip, I noticed loss of power even in fourth gear. (note it was the hottest day of the year at 100F). It seemed I used more gas than usual for that distance. I stopped for gas on the Interstate and power seemed to improve. Then about 130 miles into my trip I hit some heavy stop and go traffic, and wasn't able to keep an idle and the engine died numerous times if/when I didn't give it gas at a dead stop. The heavy stop and go heavy traffic and the issues persisted for a half hour for more than five miles. Then when traffic opened up the truck seemed to have a bit more power in 4th gear again. And up to that time all my dash gauges were showing fine. Then a couple miles or so down the interstate, driving 65mph in the inside lane, the check engine light started flashing quickly. And at the same time a sudden loss of power, rough sounding engine with heavy white smoke coming under the hood. And looked back in rear view mirror, with nothing but heavy white smoke. Managed to cross three lanes in heavy traffic and was able the vehicle to the outside emergency lane, finally coming to a stop.

Looked under the hood and saw oil dripping everywhere but with all the oil everywhere I could not find a prime source. Looked like the oil came from the top end of the engine and dripped down. Measured the oil at the dipstick and it seemed like I was at least a quart plus down (I checked the oil before I left on the trip). And it didn't look like any water was in the oil. And my radiator overflow tank was at the proper level. So I figured I lost all that oil during that period of "white smoke".

So had my vehicle towed home. Today in daylight, I did some more inspection and removed the air intake system (hoses and canister) from the air filter to the throttle body. There was significant oil up to the canister piece that fits on the air filter canister (but no oil in the actual air filter), and significant oil inside all the hoses up to inside the throttle body (up to the butterfly which I could see),

When I disconnected these hoses I noticed the blow-by hose connected to the intake hose system was not connected to anything. And a tube opening on the valve cover was open without the a blow-by hose attached and, with no clamp. So I assume all that oil and came out of that blow-by tube on the valve cover, (white smoke created by hot oil hitting the engine).

So appears to me that its not a blown head gasket or worse, which I first feared.

I have the vehicle parked at home.

QUESTIONS:

So what are the suggested steps to troubleshoot and repair? Besides reattaching everything and putting a clamp on the blow by hose? And installing new spark plugs and plug wires. I previously replaced plug wires around 60k, even though the manual recommended 100k mile replacement. (And a couple yeas back I had the dealer replace the PCV, which was recommended in the manual and included in the warranty. The timing of the initial check engine lights appeared shortly thereafter)

Is there suppose to be a large amount of oil in the air intake system after an incident like this and should I try to clean/flush out the hoses and the inline canister?

NOTE:

When I disconnected the inline canister from the hoses in the air intake system, unfortunately I failed to document the direction which the canister goes. It has outside markings "ADP with a forward arrow with some horizontal lines, and then at the other end upside down markings with a greater sign PP less than sign. Should the forward arrow point toward the throttle body or toward the air filter (I'm thinking in the direction of air flow, toward the throttle body).

if there are any other details I should post please let me know, and appreciate any assist you can offer.

I've taken some photos of the engine with air intake hose system unattached, if that might help.

Thank you.

 

[tomw]

My donut goes on: (And a couple yeas back I had the dealer replace the PCV, which was recommended in the manual and included in the warranty. The timing of the initial check engine lights appeared shortly thereafter)

From your description, I would say the PCV system was disconnected from both the intake and the cam cover.
The flow on Lima engines is clean air from the intake tube(after the air filter) to the top of the cam cover, through the engine, out the side through a maze type oil separator, through a hose, the embedded PCV, through more hose, to the bottom of the upper intake manifold.
I think one hose was connected, but the other was not, maybe... and you were getting excessive air fed into the intake that the MAF did not know about, which implies the computer knew nothing also... so it ran lean, and, BTW, generated a 'lean' code. Lean can lead to misfire, and lack of power.
The cylinder fed the leanest mix might throw a misfire code (P301). Cylinder 3 is the third from the front, more or less directly fed from the intake, where the front & rear have more intake runner. Eh, just go with it. The excess air leaned out #3 more than the others, just marginally enough to throw a code.
Fix the PCV, connect all loose hoses, and give it a spin.
FWIW, the O2 sensor was the downstream sensor from the description. Your auto parts guy was incorrect, as far a I know. O2S2 means the 2nd sensor. O2S1 is the upstream, prior to the converter. FWIW, O2S2 is the 'checker' to insure that the converter is doing its job, reducing/oxidizing/etc. It will generally be running at a more-or-less fixed voltage if things are cooking along properly.
tom