My 2015 VW T5 has developed a problem over the last 24hrs. White smoke bellowing out of the exhaust. Moreso when cold, but as the engine warms it reduces alot or even completely disappears. Oil looks OK – black but within the min/max range so no significant loss and no signs of mixing with water.

It’s a 2.0 TDi in 102bhp guise, with just under 40k miles on the clock.

My initial concern/thought is HG but I don’t seem to be losing any water, if I am it is a very very small amount so not noticed any water loss yet.

No other signs of any problems – no power loss, no hesitation or mis-firing, nothing on the dash illuminated to tell me something is up. All running just fine apart from the visible white smoke.

My other suspicions is turbo oil seals, but if that was the case i’d expect the smoke to be grey or even black from heated/partially burned oil in the exhaust – not sure if this assumption is correct though.

Can’t think of much else other than something to do with the horrendously complicated modern diesel exhaust systems need these days. I don’t think it is the type that needs Adblue, again nothing on the dash to indicate it needs it, and not spotted an adblue filler anywhere.

Read some stuff on fuel injector seals.

Any other ideas? It’ll be going off to the garage tomorrow so just looking to see what I can rule out for now.

Not sure if the van is still in warranty with VW or not, I suspect in typical style it has only just expired.

Whatever it is I suspect that is my new bike kicked down the road again!

Cheers all.

May sound silly, but its not just steam with it being a little chilly at the moment?

That’s what I hoped yesterday. Started it up and it was smoking, turned around went back home left it ticking over on the drive for a bit until it warmed up and it was fine for the tip run. This morning on the drive into work all fine, but not on the drive back home. So was hoping it was just steam or condensate in the exhaust….but its alot of smoke. Properly billowing out.

Maybe I need to drive some more to notice a drop in any of the fluid levels. If it is HG I guess it doesn’t take much water leaking into the cylinders to create alot of steam.

DPF doing a regen or something peculiar like that?

Egr cooler is a regular failure if it’s got one.

Very strange. No risk of it being miss-fueled?

Start by very carefully cleaning the MAS. (mas air flow sensor) a few tutorials on google.

It’s still under warranty no ?

Need to check on warranty. If it is 2 years I think it might have expired earlier this year, if 3 years I should be covered.

Could be misfuelled I guess, but just not getting any signs through the drive – runs smoothly, no misfire, no loss of power, hesitation etc. I’ve been around the clips on all the hoses to check for leaks, but most clips are the spring loaded ones or crimped ones rather than jubilee clips, so don’t think its a hose leak.

My brothers got an Audi, so basically the same engine, and he had an issue with the exhaust, can’t remember exactly what, but he suspected an HG failure but turned out to be the exhaust. Still a chuffing expensive fix though.

We’ll see once the mechanic gets a look. Just thought i’d check with the hive mind. Not that aware on any common VW issues but if there are i’m sure someone on here would come up with it. I guess number 1 suspect is HG, but I’d be very surprised, and dissapointed, if it is HG.

Is it smoke or steam, should be easy to tell. Steam will disparate quickly, smoke not so much and hangs around.

White smoke is usually unburnt fuel. It’s what the red arrows throw into the exhaust to make the trails, see also Guy Martin on the telly in a new tank throwing up a smoke screen the other night.

Might be a glow plug fault, but unlikely given the quantity your describing, but then again if it’s going away as it warms up…

Black smoke is excess fuel, white smoke is steam. Egr coolers leak putting coolant into exhaust.

It’s not got an auxiliary heater for the rear has it ? They can smoke a bit, you should hear a wooshing sound from under the car.

Volkswagen warranty on cars is 3 years / 60,000 miles ..so hopefully it extends to vans ..

Egr cooler is a regular failure if it’s got one

It’s only the 180hp BiTurbo engine that has those

Had a similar problem with my Skoda Octavia at 2 years old. Software update fixed it. Reckon it was just the software over compensating for components ageing over time.

As above, white smoke is usually unburned fuel. On my first generation 1.9tdi Passat, the crankshaft timing pulleys were bad for coming loose. It would knock out the timing and produce epic quantities of white smoke. Mine stopped all the traffic around the Barnton roundabout leaving Edinburgh in the evening rush hour.

Yours sounds more like condensation in the exhaust.

Black smoke is excess fuel, white smoke is steam.

or unburt diesel. Make sure all the sensors that are connected to the engine management system are working. It’s over fueling for some reason and that’s because some sensor is telling it it needs more fuel when it doesn’t, probably a temperature or air mass sensor.

Thread title had so much promise.

Egr coolers leak putting coolant into exhaust

I think this is what the issue with my brothers Audi was. I seem to remember the symptoms being similar with his.

I think the smoke is water as it does disappear quite quickly like steam would. I can’t tell if i’ve lost any water yet, it is still within the min and max marks on the expansion tank after about 50 miles of driving in this condition so if it has lost water its not alot assuming it was up at the max mark beforehand.

I’ve had these symptoms before on an older diesel. Then it was due to air getting into the fuel system. However if you symptoms have the same cause don’t run the engine as the high pressure fuel pump will be fuel lubricated. Could also be an injector, or possibly egr issue.

There should be some fault codes logged but first port of call is vw, who should provide some goodwill assistance if just out of warranty.

Bit more lubricant required?

It’ll be a 3 year warranty. Just get it sorted sharpish and don’t let it drag out until it’s not in warranty.

Can I share my vag problem?

Those min max marks on the header tank are cold levels, if you’ve run it and its up to temp it should be over those due to expansion.

I don’t know for certain, but my 2.0hdi, at the end of its time with me produced epic white smoke after prolonged tick over. Waiting at a roundabout in queuing traffic would produce battlefield levels of smoke when I finally pulled away. White as the driven snow…

The conclusion was a gubbed injector allowing fuel to leak past.

You van may not be old enough to develop a crack in the alternator due to corrosion. Check all the hoses could be a small amount of air entering and messing up the sensors readings.

wallop – Member

Can I share my vag problem? Please do!

WTF is it with the “Volkswagen Audi Group” calls?

Cant you just say my VW van (specify engine) has a problem?

I cant recall someone with say a Citroen Berlingo engine problem saying can someone help me with my Groupe PSA engine fault!

philtricklebank – Member

Thread title had so much promise.

It smells funny and has a nasty discharge, what would you recommend?

MrOvershoot – Member

I cant recall someone with say a Citroen Berlingo engine problem saying can someone help me with my Groupe PSA engine fault!

I can’t recall someone saying help me with my B18C4 problem.
Moral of the story? Don’t buy French or VAG crap. 😀

My Touran did this at the start of every winter, white smoke under the car during warm up. Turns out it was fitted with a pre heater to aid cold starting. Check to see if the white smoke is coming from a little ridged pipe half way along the underside. If so, it’s just the pre heater kicking in.

Cant you just say my VW van (specify engine) has a problem?

Partly because the small child within will always find this funny, but mainly because the engine is shared across the cars within the whole groups so don’t want to narrow down the number of people who also drive Audi’s, Seat’s, Skoda’s etc. who might have had the same issue.

My Touran did this at the start of every winter, white smoke under the car during warm up. Turns out it was fitted with a pre heater to aid cold starting. Check to see if the white smoke is coming from a little ridged pipe half way along the underside. If so, it’s just the pre heater kicking in

Fraid not, it’s definitely coming out of the exhaust pipe only. Doesn’t smell like unburned fuel, so think it is water. If water i’m assuming HG is the primary suspect in light of the below…..

Egr cooler is a regular failure if it’s got one

It’s only the 180hp BiTurbo engine that has those

Just re-read the thread and spotted this. Bummer, I was hoping it might be that. Are you sure it’s not the lower powered models that have it too? There is a little exhaust light that illuminates along with the glowplug light that is the shape of the exhaust, that I have to wait to go out before starting so it does have some complicated exhaust shenanigans fitted.

Anyway, it’ll be heading VW way. I just hope they’ll actually try to troubleshoot it and not scatter gun it at my expense which is my experience with dealers.

MAF sensor or split hose on the air intake somewhere

My 2011 2.0tdi recently had an EGR fail (105k miles), there was nothing noticeably wrong apart from it occasionally going into limp home mode, until eventually it was always in limp home mode, scanning the ECU gave an EGR fault.
Expensive fix, but you should still be under warranty.
Have you scanned the ECU for faults?

The Wrong Trousers – Member

It’s only the 180hp BiTurbo engine that has those

Many of the 2.0TDI engines have an ego cooler, its not confined to the BiTurbo.

When my Wife’s old Nissan Qashqai had the exact same symptoms, it was the injectors. Fortunately, fixed under warranty as the repair came to about £1,500.

I’m going with injectors. Been here before.

Leak off test would be my first port of call(garage job for you needs tooks)

Also check your oil level another side effect of a leaking injector is that your oil level can rise as the excess fuel passed the piston ring.

Well just an update on this for the benefit of those kind enough to take and interest and chime in on the thread. The van is going into VW tomorrow and had a really good chat with the service manager this afternoon about it. I’ve not driven the van for a week since I got the white smoke a week last Sunday and again on Monday, but took it out for a spin on Saturday. It had indeed lost water – the level had gone down from max to just below min (when cold) so I topped up before my test drive on Saturday and after a good 40 minute test drive the level had dropped the same amount again….but this time no smoke, so not sure if it was cold or humid enough or not.

He seems to think number 1 suspect is the exhaust EGR valve cooler. My van has one and he’s got the parts in assuming its that, but they will be doing a thorough check of the cooling system to confirm. The van is still under warranty so he confirmed it would be a warranty job if it is that issue. So i’ll wait and see if this cause is confirmed.

Other things that will be done under warranty – a new timing belt and tensioner as my engine is affected by a known issue where the timing belt can break (!) and a new high level rear light, which apparently can pop out on tailgate models due to some pressure build up within the tailgate door.

So we’ll see tomorrow what transpires. But in the meantime thanks all for your input.

I skimmed this whole thread just to see what perchypanther could do with the “vag problem” and now I’m disappointed.

Another cookie for me 🙂