Guys, noticed over the past week that im getting a rusty looking colour inside the tailpipes....nothing has changed on the car lately.

 

Does this mean its running a bit rich and can this be damaging at all?

 

Cheers,

 

Dan.

It it's running rich it would be a deep black I believe.

Given that the rusty colour is at your tail pipe I would say that it is through rust but back to my motorcycling days optimum fuel burn is indicated by a brown powdery residue on the spark plug; black is too rich and white is too lean.

If you want to be sure your car is burning fuel efficiently you could do a plug chop as we did on the bikes however YOUR CAR HAS A STEERING LOCK so you may or may not be able to use this method as YOU MAY CRASH.

 

As follows :-

Warm the engine then head out to a quiet piece of road.

 

In lets say second or third gear drive along the road at a steady 3/4 throttle for as long as you have road then the engine must be cut promptly. THIS IS WHERE YOU WILL CRASH IF YOUR STEERING LOCK COMES ON. On a motorbike you have the luxury of a kill switch, on a car if you only have the ignition switch you run the risk of engaging the steering lock.

 

Now before the engine is run again, remove your plugs and see what colour the residue is.

 

Anyway for your purposes a rusty brown colour is good news.

tnx guys very intuitive!