Burning smell occasionally from the hood?

MEIRJAKUB

MEMBER
2001 FORD TAURUS

I have smelled a burning smell occasionally from the hood of my car after driving it. Recently we were driving on the highway and my wife complained of smelling a funny sweet smell in the car. About fifteen minutes later we saw a greenish smoke coming from our front hood when we stopped and the smoke soon cleared. What is the problem with the car?

1 Reply

SQM

MECHANIC
6,383 POSTS

Hello,

The sweet smell is coolant that is possibly leaking and getting on the hot exhaust manifold, that's when you see the smoke. You will have to visually do an inspection to see what might be leaking. From the sound of it, probably got a hose that ruptured and got coolant to spray all over.

https://www.2carpros.com/articles/coolant-leak-symptoms
https://www.2carpros.com/articles/car-is-leaking-coolant

Since you could smell the coolant it could be the heater hose leaking.
The heater hose runs into the firewall and attached with the heater core.

https://www.2carpros.com/articles/replace-heater-hoses

You could also have a leak from one of the radiator hose. Best option would be to do a thorough inspection and see if you can detect the leak.
You can also do a pressure test the coolant system to find the leak. On that test the tester will simulate pressure that the engine is under while running. Which makes it easy to find leak.

Here is a helpful video:

https://youtu.be/W8kra65m15c

https://www.2carpros.com/articles/radiator-pressure-test

Please let me know of any questions.

Thank you.

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