White smoke....and lots of it

[eightiesguy]

Yesterday my wife was on her way to work and her car started smoking out of the tail pipe. My gut is telling me it is the head gasket, but the oil isn't milky and I'm not getting any bubbles in the radiator when the engine is running. I checked the compression, and it appears to be okay (all 4 cylinders were between 180-210 psi), I squirted some oil down inside the cylinders and all came up about the same amount (now 210-240 psi).

Now I'm at a standstill. I don't want to start tearing into the motor without being confident that I'm on the right track. I would like to avoid having it towed to a mechanic if at all possible (due to the fact that I live in a very small town, and it would have to be towed 20-30 miles to a mechanic).

The car is a 98 camry. It has 150,000+ miles on it. It is a 4 cylinder, 2.2L engine.

Any help/suggestions anyone can give me are greatly appreciated

[csaxon]

May be nothing but moisture (condensation) in the exhaust pipe or bad gas.

[eightiesguy]

It's more than just moisture or bad gas.... the smoke is from oil

It has improved considerably. I changed the pcv valve and did an oil change (and put in a bottle of Rislone engine treatment). I can start the car and it doesn't smoke on idle (I've let it idle for 15 minutes plus without any smoke). I can run the car up to around 2000 rpm for 3-4 minutes before I see any smoke. After that I can see smoke at idle. If I turn off the car for a couple o minutes and start it again, it is once again smoke free at idle.

This has me stumped. Maybe it is something terminal in the engine, but it seems to run fine other than the smoke. (And it is smoking less than it was, so something must be getting better).

[DFBonnett]

I'd check every vac line going into the intake for any kind of residue then trace the line back to the source. Particularly look for vac lines going to anything that shares a connection with coolant lines or the transmission. A leak of either into the intake will produce white smoke.

[eightiesguy]

I drove the car today (for about 30 minutes around town... first time I've driven it since it started smoking), and only noticed smoke once during the trip (when the engine was under load going up a hill).

I think that the intake has gotten oil in it (possibly due to a clogged pcv valve), and it's just taking a while for it to all burn off. I have taken most (if not all) lines going into the intake off, and found oil in most of them.