Like my title states, my 2001 Silverado with a 5.3 LS has recently started to smoke quite a bit from the exhaust. A bit of events leading to this are as follows:

About two weeks ago from today, I had a small overheating issue thinking it was the waterpump/tstat. I ordered a new Gates water pump and t-stat plus a new serpentine belt. I installed all of these new parts plus added new coolant and bleed the system. Drove for a few days and noticed one afternoon a slight leak of coolant coming from one of the radiator hoses. I tighten and refill to proper coolant level and go a out my day. I know have it in the back of my head to look for any leaks or problems of the same sort.

I then started to notice on morning commutes to work at start up that the truck would start to smoke a bit from the exhaust. White smoke. It would go away once it got into operating temperature. Well today I noticed it did it more consistently. Plus, when checking it out once parked in my driveway i notcied a small area of oil on the driveway. It was what looked like watery oil from the exhaust pipes after the headers. I do have a bit of exhaust leak but crazy that oil like fluid is coming out of it.

I then check my oil level and coolant levels fearing the worst and the oil level and oil looked good as the recent oil change was done. The coolant level was lower.

I'm sorry for the story but wanted to include all info i can to get some good advice. Now that the truck is heavily smoking white smoke, is my ol 5.3 with 190k done? Are my heads bad? Head gaskets blown? Worse?? Any advice would be super appreciated!

 

Head gasket or if you have castech cylinder heads it may be those.

 

OK that gives me an idea of what needs to be done. May end up getting a set of heads and a cosmetic head gasket set ad well.

 

What are some things too look out for when taking apart the heads and head gadgets?

 

If you have 706 heads, good chance they are cracked. but i do have a set of 706s that have been on my truck for 300k no an without an issue.

What i would do is pull off both valve covers and look at the oil left up there, see if you can see anything odd up there, Next, i would pressure test the system and see what happens. I would double check to see if it coolant. My truck did that for a little and got worse light yours but ended up being a broken PCV valve spring in the assy. in the tube, replaced that and did a fuel service cleaning and was good to go!

if they are cracked, good time to get into a set of 243s or 799s (same heads) and if you havent yet, cam, new lifters and just do a top end rebuild (new oil pump, new timing chains and gears i rec. ls2 as they are a cheap good upgrade. LS7 lifters, MLS gaskets, yours may come with graphite, mine did they did use MLs untill 200 or 2001 so our 01 if between that year. The MLS will hold up a lot better the heat and power and they are really inexpensive. My Felpro MLS were like 100 bucks or less.)

 

Is it loosing coolant?

Look around the cylinder ring for signs that the gasket was leaking.

It may be subtle. If you google Blown head gasket and search the images you will see various things to look for.

 

Awesome feedback/advice man thanks a ton to you and everyone else chiming in my thread! I'm leaning towards doing a top and build like you suggested since im going to be in there anyways.

Coolant has been lowering in the coolant reservoir. I'll do that and check the engine sides for proof of leaking. But I'm almost sure now with these suggestions that I have cracked heads since it is an 01. I'll confirm in the next day or two. Guess I'll daily the 240sx for now lol!
​​​

 

So this morning I confirmed a blown head gasket at the very least. Found coolant in my oil when opening up my oil cap to check. Dam sucks😣. Wasn't planning on head mods and cam upgrades but looks like since im down there I might as well 🤔🤔🤔🤔