Whit Smoke and Rough Running on Start Up

Hi everyone.

First post!

On my TD5 Defender it has started blowing out white smoke. I start it from cold and it runs fine, then i go to press the throttle and it starts to run rough and white smoke blows out of the exhaust, it will clear itself after about 5 to 10 seconds of running like this. The smoke looks like unburnt diesel or oil to me but I don't really know. There is no loss in power when driving and it is not using any water. I recentley filled it up with oil. Does anybody have any ideas what could be casuing this. I spoke to one chap and he said that one of the glow plugs may not be working but I have a horrible feeling it may be a headgasket, but if it is not smoking the whole time does this rule a head gasket problem out???

Let me know you thoughts.

Cheers

Bish

White smoke is usually fuel - have a smell of it, if it smells like a red arrows flypast then it's fuel, if it smells like a cross between last weeks socks and an illegal still then it's coolant.

So if it is fuel would you say that one of the glow plugs may not be working properly and therefore a bit of unburnt fuel is flowing through the system.........it smells like av gas so must be fuel!

Forget the glow pugs,its more likely a leaking injector washer allowing fuel to leak into the combustion chamber,and the missing is caused by the air that replaces the fuel in the rail - which is purged after a few seconds of running.

That would make sense. Thanks for this, should be able to narrow it down a bit further now. Cheers

try a bottle of diesel magic as well.
white smoke is usuallyt an injector problem or glazed cylinder walls.

Thanks everyone. Checked the glow plugs first.........all 4 of them where not working so replaced those and it is cured! Cheers.