Kawasaki 6.5hp smokes at startup...sometimes???

[dalel20]

My toro commercial with a Kawasaki FJ180AV 6.5 hp motor smokes at startup, occasionally? My nephew normally runs it while I trim and he told me after about the 4th dump it smokes so bad you can barely see the mower it does stop after awhile though. he loves this mower. It totally kicks the **** out of my HRX. Any ideas. I use 10W-30 Valvoline. Outside temp doesn't seem to matter anywhere between 50-80 deg. I know very little about this machine. We picked it up on the street corner during spring cleanup week!!!! So I have a little wiggle room as far as repairs. I am a fairly decent small engine mechanic so feel free to fire away. Will trade advice on Bobcat mini-excavators.

[SLR]

Blue,Black or White smoke?

[dalel20]

Blue and white sorry

[Fisher40037]

Blue and white sorry


No red??

Seriously, some dirt under the carb needle, or a bad needle can leak off sporadically, dumping fuel into the intake, and on some engines, make its
way to the crankcase oil. Once to the oil, which also makes the crankcase
overfull, and the excess gets burned off.
Smell the dipstick, if it smells gassy, then I would look in the carb.


Also, if the engine is an OHV, the head gasket, starting to fail, can
pressurize the crankcase, and force oil mist into the intake. It can be on and off at the onset....


Fish

[mowermankevin]

Dalel, First off welcome to Lawnsite, it's without question the best place for answers. The FJ is one of the worst, cheapest, poorest designed P.O.S. I've ever seen put on Toro's, Exmarks, whatever... I've worked on so many of these that it's not unusual to rebuild 4 a weekend. What your describing sounds like a bad head gasket, cracked head or valve guide, all 3 which I had last weekend. You may not like the Honda ($100 more) but I'm tired of the crap Kawa is building, so even if the Honda doesn't have an oil filter, they are holding up better than Kawa's

[jkason]

Blue smoke is oil, white smoke is oil residue burning out of the muffler. CHECK YOUR OIL LEVEL!!

If you are going to check for the head gasket, get a new one first - they are NOT reusable.
if it was the gasket, that should take care of the problem, but I would switch to a straight 30-wieght oil (it will burn less).