[BlackS14]

About a month ago I had a real problem with running rich....and as we all know there are so many factors as to why it would run rich...I decided to knock them all out one by one. Got the car all back together and tried to start her up and it wouldn't start...ended up being a massive fuel leak started due to stressed o-rings. I went and replaced both o-rings on each injector and she fired right up.

Drove well for two whole days....this past weekend I started it up after paying my cell phone bill and I noticed the idle was lumpy, but nothing real bad. I thought nothing of it and proceeded to drive to my buddies house. Well I got about two miles down the road and was at a stoplight when all of the sudden my idle really starts to dip (I had it set at 1,000....it dipped to 800, 500, 300) and I looked in the rear view and noticed TONS of thick white smoke pouring from the exhaust. I kept it alive and drove it into a parking lot and it just died.

I got around to it the day after to see what was going on. I pulled all the spark plugs and noticed they were semi black, but number two was pitch black. On a whim I puled the fuel rail again and sure enough the lower o-ring was bulged and leaking like a siv. After a couple of tries I finally got it to seat right, pressurized the systme and noticed no leaks. Installed the rail again and tried to start again....nothing....number two was filled with fuel again. Either the o-ring bulged again (didn't have time to check) or I'm thinking the injector is stuck open (have yet to check the resistance).

Cliff Notes:
. Replaced injector o-rings
. two days later idle is bad and TONS of white smoke purs out of the exhaust
. fixed o-ring on number two that was found to have bulged
. cyllinder still fills with gas at a moments notice when pressurizing fuel system


Questions:

1. My injectors DO NOT have the small pintle caps on them (the yellowish/tan four pronged plastic hats that are found on the "squirting" end of the injector). Are these caps neccessary for proper operation....I have had friends tell me that they will still spray fine with them off......but I think they are there to help protect the lower o-ring from doing exactly what mine did....bulge...any thoughts?

2. In regards to the white smoke....what could that have been. I know black smoke is fuel and white is coolant. I presumed it to possibly be a head gasket, but the car ran for a good 5 minutes after it first started smoking and my temp stayed at a solid 180 degrees and after checking, there was no coolant in oil or the reverse......what could that have beem?

Thanks guys....give me anything and everything you might be thinking...

-Bill