Hello, So i recently bought a 08 Arctic Cat 700. After a few weeks of riding it, i noticed that it has started to smoke a bit(white smoke).
I checked the oil and it was low. I went ahead and drained it completely and refilled with a full synthetic castrol. 0w30.
After the refill and turning it back on it smoked something fierce! (again white smoke).

While running i pulled the oil fill cap off and noticed a good bit of air blowing back out....not sure if this is normal on an ATV.

I know on alot of cars with this issue it is alot of times a clogged PCV.
Do these ATVs have PCV valves? does this sound like an issue? or maybe bad rings??

thanks.

 

I am not sure if the 700 has a PCV but it should have a crankcase vent tube. The carborated models have a vent tube that goes from the top of the crank case to the intake. I am not sure where it is on the 700 as it is fuel injected but it should be there some place.

Also, as far as I know white smoke is usually water blue smoke is oil. So the real question is what is your coolant level? I am pretty sure it is water cooled and not oil cooled. Some times you have to access the radiator cap through a plastic access port under the front rack.

You could have a blown head gasket that is leaking coolant into the combution chamber some how. The white smoke sometimes has an odd sweet smell to it if it has antifreeze in it.

Swampy

 

A "sickingly" sweet smell.

SWAMPY is right. Coolant "burns" white - oil "burns" blue. You also may want to re-think CASTROL as a oil. Synthetic is fine, but I'm not positive if CASTROL is "wet-clutch" compatible.

Check your coolant level ASAP. It doesn't take much to blow wht smoke & if you've "blown" a head gasket you may also see little oil beads mixed up IN that coolant. That's another sure indicator you've got problems.


Goodluck!

 

thanks for the replies. When I get home from work today I am going to check into the coolant. Never dawned on me to check that but makes since. I've got 4 arctic cats and this is the first one to give any sort of issue so far. It still runs and idles great, so hopefully it won't be anything serious. but thanks again for the replies.