First of all hello! My first time around!

Well basically my girlfriends Jag just did something strange. Aboit an hour ago we where on a red light and the car we started to see some smoke (not too much) coming from around the passangers headlight, and then it started to smell like burning rubber. I thought of the headlight harness problem from this cars but I changed that headlight about 3 months ago (thanks to DIY found here). Engine temperature did not change and nocstange noises comming from the engine bay. The color of the smoke looked white but I could not really tell since its dark outside...

Anyone has any input?


Thanks!!!
Juan Luis

 

Forgot to say the car is a 2004 3.0 automatic.

 

Should have pulled over popped thehood and shown light on where the smoke is coming from, THeres you problem lol

 

Mr. John, as comical as Disco's comment about popping the hood and looking for the smoke is, that would have been the best way to go. But, I would venture to guess that if you open up the passenger side headlight (ie, remove the back cover), you will notice that the headlight base is probably melted and blackened. But, that is a guess. Short of getting the car to smoke again, hard to say what it was. A good visual under the hood for anything abnormal will be advisable.

 

Unfortunatelly my girlfriend has no flashlight in the car so when we got to her home (within a block away) the smoke was not visible any longer. I will check the headlight just in case, but I doubt its that since its only 3 months old :S but who knows...

Thanks guys!!

 

Mr. John, the only other thing that I can possibly think of is that you had either a car near you or the exhaust was flowing along the underside of the car and just happen to come up in that area. When the motor is cold, you can see the white vapors forming. Depending on the conditions, you could see it coming up where you saw it. But, without a "smoking" gun, hard to say what it was.

 

Mr. John did you recently have an oil change? Our cars tend to leak oil on to the exhaust manifold when you remove the oil filter. If it was done let's say at a jiffy lube the mechanic might not have noticed and popped a new filter on there and was done with it. Most of us do our own oil change and are aware of this so we usually clean around that area to make sure there is no oil around to burn off. Just a thought...

 

Does anyone have any idea what causes a burning smell in a car? A radio talk show guest says that from his decades long experience as a car mechanic it could be 1 or more of three things that could have given a burning smell to a car, and I simply forgot what they were. Would anyone care to input on that? The drips from oil change may be a cause for the smell, which is outside of the 3 causes mentioned above, but it should go away after a while. What else could cause a burning smell in a car?

My previous car had that smell before I took it in for water pump and thermostat replacment. The smell lingered faintly. I noticed the same smell in someone's Land Rover, a stronger lingering smell from time to time, but the car was checked out to be fine by a dealer. Does a burning smell signify a mechanical or electrical problem of some sort in a car?