steam at rear of engine at hatch latch

[Joe Gliksman]

I have steam at rear of engine when hot, right at bottom of glass hatch. It almost stops after sitting at idle a few minutes, and is very hard to detect any after shutting off engine. I have tried many times to find it, and assume it is a very small coolant leak, but is there coolant at rear/back of motor?
Coolant tank does not seem to be going down? Anyone help with this mystery? Thanks

 

[Briank]

Look at the lines that go to and from the oil cooler right above the oil filter.

 

[pgilliam1]

Are you sure it's steam? When my valve cover seals leaked a little bit, it dripped oil onto the catalytic converter. At startup, the converters would get hot, the oil would smoke (exactly where yours does) and then stop after the oil burned off. It was only 1 or 2 drops of oil, but it made quite a bit of smoke. Happy Motoring!

 

[Joe Gliksman]

I'll check both this weekend--I assumed it was coolant, and I think I smell coolant, but could be oil. I will check both this and above the oil filter as BrianK suggests--this weekend--thanks for the help.

 

[Larry Bastanza]

What ever it is, if it is coolant, I would recommend you do not use the car, except to find it. If you blow a hose, and you are driving, it will be a very bad day for the wallet.

Regards,
LarryB

 

[Honcho]

Are you sure it's steam? When my valve cover seals leaked a little bit, it dripped oil onto the catalytic converter. At startup, the converters would get hot, the oil would smoke (exactly where yours does) and then stop after the oil burned off. It was only 1 or 2 drops of oil, but it made quite a bit of smoke. Happy Motoring!

I had the exact same issue. I had a spool valve leak and oil had dripped onto the exhaust manifold. Every time I shut off the car, thin white smoke would come out of the rear hatch vent. I replaced the spool gaskets and after a while, no more smoke.

The next time it smokes, smell it. If it smells like coolant, listen to LarryB. If it smells like burned oil, look for a valve cover or spool valve leak.

 

[Kitaka]

I've have the same "wiff of smoke' issue that I can see while sitting still (after a good run) and looking in my side or rear-view mirror. I also have evidence of oil dripping on the pavement. Your problem reads just like mine, It's oil leaking from either the valve covers or the spool gaskets.

I plan to fix both this summer along with the cam plugs and a valve adjust

 

[crx-nsx]

Larry is right. If its a coolant then dont drive it. I had replaced mine last year when i ran into the same problem. I was going to have larry do it but damaged my front bumper and few other parts. So the shop that fixed my car brought it to honda to do alignment just in case it was off. Since it was there i had ordered all the hoses and had my buddy that works there work on my car.

I had a problem with my overflow coolant tank. It had 6 cracks in it. Cant be seen. Larry told me to buy a new one just by talking to him over the phone. He knew right away what it might be. So i bought one. And when i took mine off i found more hair line cracks.

I also had a valve cover gasket leak as well as the spool valve seals. I replaced all of it. But valve covers are very hard to do on the nsx.

 

[Joe Gliksman]

Thanks so much for all the help and input--in my case looks like it is oil. i finally found time to check it out today. The car has 140K miles, but only ~500 in the last 5 years so I think the oil has not had as much chance to burn off on long runs as it once did--there's 18-years of oily dirt at the rear of the engine. My plan is to clean the engine and see exactly where and how much the leak is.