The car hasn't been started in a month. I started it today and it had was immediately making a significant clunking noise that seemed to start quieting down a little right away, but I turned it off after a few seconds. Smoke or steam was coming from somewhere too. I'm not sure of the source, but it seemed to be coming from the passenger side, and possibly the transmission area, but with the wind it was hard to tell.

An important note: I have a slow coolant leak (probably the infamous s/c hose) and a very slow oil leak through the valve cover gaskets I think.

I did check the oil level and coolant beforehand.

I'm just wondering if it's safe to start it again to try and diagnose without causing irreparable damage? I usually do all my maintenance, but I'm wondering if I should just tow it to an indy before anything gets worse. My car has around 67k miles.

Thanks!

 

hi
its hard to sat without hearing it
but have you checked both front belts, that one has not come off or nothing got in there
as long as its got plenty of oil in ans the oil light goes straight out once you start it should be ok
if you going to take it a garage there going to run it as they will want to hear it
if it was running fine before it stood it should not be anything major one would hope
cheers

 

The smoke could be from the oil leak you mentioned and dripped onto exhaust parts....burning oil has a distinct smell as does burning coolant....burning coolant smells sweet.....the clunk could possibly be the supercharger coupler....they are noisey at first and quiet down when older, especially if still oem....

 

Thanks guys. I had a clunk once before because the water pump pulley was loose, so I'm going to verify those are all still tight and then try again. This is the first time I have heard about the SC coupler, so I'll look more into that too.