REALLY bad smell of gas surrounding my car and inside...
It started out as a faint smell of gas inside my 2011 Camaro and gradually got worse, now you can smell it completely surrounding my car outside after it is parked. It's not smoking out of the exhaust at all but my husband rubbed the inside of the exhaust because they looked black and said there was a black liquid inside of them. Any idea what's going on???
No check engine light on...
No check engine light on...
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October 2009 ROTM
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If you are just smelling raw gas you may have a fuel leak. There should be no way unburnt gas can get to an exhaust tip if the engine is running anywhere near normal.
It was possible for raw gas to make it through the exhaust before catalytic converters. The Catalytic converter does a lot of things but acting like a furnace is a big part of it. Normally if a engine is getting too much gas it will set a check engine light and the extra gas is burned in the Cat. If you start to get raw gas into the cat the check engine light should blink. A blinking check engine light is a warning to stop driving the car. This is because it will damage the Catalytic converter. The converter will try to burn the gas but if there is not enough O2 then it will soot up the inside of the Cat and it will no longer do Cat things and then you will get a rotten egg / sulfur smell along with raw gas. Also at this point your car would be running like crap. Either cylinder(s) are not firing allowing raw fuel past or the injectors a spraying way too much fuel making the engine shake or leave the engine with no power.
Car that run rich enough to damage the cat run the risk of the Cat burning so hot it will glow red. If you park in the grass or leaves it can cause a fire. This is much more common then you think. I have even had customers complain about a burning smell only to find singed carpet padding and bunt paint just above the Cat on the inside of the car and that is with the factory heat shield in place.
Its is not all gloom. Fuel leaks tend to be relatively cheap to fix as long as the gas tank is not the point of leakage. A crack in a fuel line is not a big deal even for a DIY'er. Finding the leak is normally the hard part. Some lines can be bough right from GM and if you want to save a few buck and you have a real parts store they can make a line for you. I think the last one I had made to 3ft long and cost me $48 and that had a GM fuel filter end on it.
It was possible for raw gas to make it through the exhaust before catalytic converters. The Catalytic converter does a lot of things but acting like a furnace is a big part of it. Normally if a engine is getting too much gas it will set a check engine light and the extra gas is burned in the Cat. If you start to get raw gas into the cat the check engine light should blink. A blinking check engine light is a warning to stop driving the car. This is because it will damage the Catalytic converter. The converter will try to burn the gas but if there is not enough O2 then it will soot up the inside of the Cat and it will no longer do Cat things and then you will get a rotten egg / sulfur smell along with raw gas. Also at this point your car would be running like crap. Either cylinder(s) are not firing allowing raw fuel past or the injectors a spraying way too much fuel making the engine shake or leave the engine with no power.
Car that run rich enough to damage the cat run the risk of the Cat burning so hot it will glow red. If you park in the grass or leaves it can cause a fire. This is much more common then you think. I have even had customers complain about a burning smell only to find singed carpet padding and bunt paint just above the Cat on the inside of the car and that is with the factory heat shield in place.
Its is not all gloom. Fuel leaks tend to be relatively cheap to fix as long as the gas tank is not the point of leakage. A crack in a fuel line is not a big deal even for a DIY'er. Finding the leak is normally the hard part. Some lines can be bough right from GM and if you want to save a few buck and you have a real parts store they can make a line for you. I think the last one I had made to 3ft long and cost me $48 and that had a GM fuel filter end on it.
Last edited by Gorn; Apr 22, 2024 at 08:46 AM.
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