Just got my wifes x-type on the road, been sitting for 2 years, now the darn thing smokes when you start it. I believe it to be the valve seals how the car only smokes when started and if you get into it real hard. I called the local shop and they say that it is a engine pull job, 30+ hours of labor, $3500. The car is a 2004 3.0 and has 64000 miles. Any suggestions? Thanks

 

That does indicate worn valve guides. When you have the car off for a period of time oil will slip by them and enter the combustion chamber. That's why you see smoke on start up that vanishes when the oil is burned off.
At this point the low miles are meaningless since you basically need a new motor. Perhaps you can find another car for just a few grand more?
Of course if the cars interior and exterior are worth keeping I have heard that you can have a Lincoln engine put in instead.

 

So the valve seal replacement should warrant a new engine? If I'm understanding correctly, instead of replacing my valve seals, I should just replace the entire engine?

Thanks

 

Does it only smoke when started? Keep an eye on oil level and just drive it! When younger, my wife had an old Dodge that smoked like a chimney fire for the first few minutes after startup, and would quit once driven down the road, but went through less than a half quart of oil in 1,000 miles. Yours can't be that bad is it?

 

yes, only smokes when started, oil level seems to be fine, only driven it for about 100 miles since being back on the road. Thanks

 

I agree. I'd just drive it. It might even clear up if driven regularly.

I have an old Alfa Romeo Milano and an old Datsun that both do this if I let them go too long without driving them. They both straighten up after a few days if I drive them every day.

And if comes down to teardown, an engine swap with a good used engine will be a lot less expensive than repairing yours. It was for me.

It's too late for you to do this but when I did my engine swap, the car and the engine going in had also set for 2 years. I pulled the sparkplugs out and spun the engine for 1 minute total under no load with the starter and confirmed everything was wet with oil. Were going for the initial restart this afternoon. If I have the two coolant leaks fixed.

 

I agree with RudyF6 and AlfaVeloce - just drive it.

There are a lot of quality products that will help "renew" the seals. Most cost under $10 USD.

Try a can of "juice" in the crankcase:



If you read the reviews, and watch the ScottKilmer.com video mentioned in one of the first reviews, you'll probably agree it's worth a try at $9.99.

Non-petroleum, not just for trannies, purported to be non-snake oil.

(The "Old-Schoolers" here in the forum will remember when the "Better Living Through Chemistry" cure for the leaky valve seals was 1/2 quart of auto tranny fluid in the crankcase)

 

The answer is
It depends.

Since you're not doing the work yourself, which 99% of us wouldn't be able to do either, the labor cost far exceeds what you're really getting. For $3500 you can get a whole engine installed. Now, we need to think about practicality for this scenario. How much is the car worth in working order? If this engine repair is almost 50% what the car is worth then I would personally forgo the repair and simply drive the car the way it is. Realistically it's drivable and you might even get another 50k miles out of it. What will happen down the road is your catalytic converter will get clogged from passing the additional combusted oil. But this could happen years from now.
Here's another reason to perhaps not bother with the repair. Since the valve guides are worn perhaps there another stuff worn too, like the rings or bearings. It would suck to dump all that money into the car and then 6 months later the camshaft bearing goes.
I would run thicker oil in it for now. A high mileage blend. This might help with the smoking by quite a bit. You know, all this might just go away on its own too.
You did say the car sat for two years. Maybe it needs to blow out a lot of crap from just sitting.

 

Do a compression and/or leak-down test on the engine. If you're lucky it may only be valve seals, but then you may also have other seal problems in places like transmission, drive line, engine, etc.