Hello forum,

I have a problem with my F150 98 Extended cab truck. It seems if I drive it around for awhile I can start to smell something in the cab. Then if I open up the hood I see some smoke and hear a "hissing" sound. The sound eventually goes away. Also the feel of my truck is altered a bit when this starts. It's alittle heavier but it's very hard to explain.

I'm a truck NOVICE which is code for I know nothing about auto repair. Before I take it to be fixed I was hoping I could maybe have some insight and see if this seems like an easy fix. Like a certain fluid or something?

Thanks all!

 

are you loosing coolant? do you have great plumes of smoke out the tail pipe?

from your description it lends itself to a bad heater core....or at the very least a bad hose going to the heater core.

If just a bad hose...that is not tooo bad cost wise. if it is bad heater core, that is another story. One needs to take the whole dash apart....and once in there...it might be a good idea to look at the blend door.

Among other possibilities are that you may have a bad radiator hose as well ...or head gasket or intake gasket .

wish that I could be more positive....but it has potential to be serious problem and should be addressed before it compounds into something more

 

Thanks enriched!

I'm not sure about the smoke out of the tail pipe. I don't think so but don't know.

I'm thinking it's a leak of a hose or something. When I pop the hood on the very top and middle in there there appears to be sometype of leak in a hose. There's a change over between two pipes and and from there one pipe is wet and the other is not.

Thanks again,
Ed

 

I've added a couple of photo's of where I believe my problem is coming from. I don't know anything about trucks really so if anyone could identify these items and tell me the best course of action I'd appreciate it.

This hose shown where there is a coupling seemed to be very wet on the right side of the coupling. The other side of the hose seemed wet but down where it's origin is.

Thanks!

http://imageshack.us/f/842/f150.png

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/688/f1502.png

 

Is the small hose the same in both pix's? If so that appears to be part of the air condictioner (A/C) lines it runs whenever you have it on defrost and obviously when the A/C is on....it is normal for these to get condensation on them maybe even frosty with high temps. The vertical tube/canister in #688 (2nd pix) is also part of your A/C system, NO it is not a pump.

the larger hose in pix #842 (1st pix) seems to be the air intake hose, which funnels air into the throttle body & eventually each individual cylinder. {The throttle body is the link to the accelerator pedal inside the cab.} This intake hose should have a larger round canister as it leads away from the engine nearer the drivers side fender... inside this larger canister is the air filter. Anyway you care to look at it... the air intake hose should not ever be wet on the inside...before or after the air filter.

what size engine is that 4.2v6?

 

those look like air conditioner lines. THese lines will "swet" when they are cool with the air conditioner running. Feel the wetness... is it just water ? Sometimes you can get frost or ice on the lines...I would still watch the radiator overflow tank and see if it using water over the period of a week or so. Hissing sound is sometimes not abnormal.. That can happend with radiator pressure / air conditioner pressure/ when motot is shut off and pressure bleeds off. -------- look for oil or antifreeze leaks on the motor, or antifreeze level change over time (internal leak).

 

Thank you guys!

I had a feeling it may be an A/C thing. I've been runnin my AC on full blast for the last few years because it only works on high. That goes for the heat as well. I had it on alot right before I had this problem.

So I guess the qestion than evolves to this. So when the A/C was on this time I started to smell something burning and smoke was coming out from under the hood. What are my possibilities here? Bad motor? Or is the engine the motor for the AC? What exactly is that canister? Is that like a freon thing or something? Do you think it could be bad or is it that the intake line is bad so causing it to overheat?

I'm not sure what my engine is to be honest. My ignorance with cars is embarrassing really. lol. But it's a 1998 F150 pick up so whatever engine they usually have I have. It has 195k miles! Yikes

Thanks again

 

Smoke??
OK lets start with basics....
How is your oil level, is it where it should be? (your owner manual will tell you where to check it)
How is coolant level? again (your owner manual will tell you where to check it)

How is the power steering level? again (your owner manual will tell you where to check it)
& lastly brake fluid level?? again (your owner manual will tell you where to check it)

If you have to add to any of these, oil ,or coolant, or power steering, and or brake fluid, monitor how fast you need to add more.

 

Ya I know smoke is bad!!! lol

I'm having a problem with my power steering fluid for sure. I've been filling it up regularly and the level looks ok.. The oil is ok. I haven't checked any of the other stuff but recently had everything capped off at a lube place. I'm probably leaking something else maybe?

 

could be as simple as a steering hose has a crack or bad crimp fitting and is leaking a mist onto the exhaust manifold... you need to just look closer, or have someone look that can figure out what the "smoke" is.

 

Thanks Steve,

You know I've been driving it the last few days. The max distance I drove before I stopped for awhile was 10 miles. I did NOT put the A/C on and I haven't had a problem. Can it be reasonable to assume that that is the probably culprit here?