I had exactly the same problem last week and thought it was the turbo too, scared the cr*p outa me.
Went to the garage and it turned out to be a leaky rocker cover seal - £14. Thank god.
Oil had gotten onto the exhaust hence the smoke. Prob was when I got it fixed alot more oil got on the exhaust and took a couple of days hard driving to burn off - loadsa smoke. Had some funny emails at work from people thinking the car was on fire in the car park, fine now though.

Hope this helps.

Tom

[Edited by Thehut - 11/3/2003 12:16:26 PM]

Just wondered if anyone else had experienced similar problems.
I was sitting if traffic today for approx 20 mins,no problems with the engine heat,when i finally got clear of the traffic i put the heater on which is when i the smell of burning oil comes in.I then stop at a set of lights and to my shock what appears to be steam rises from the bonnet.At this point i'm thinking maybe it's just down to the rain water getting in so i continue.When i use the car again in the evening i get the same burning smell so i stop and pop the bonet to which i find steam/smoke coming from around the turbo.Now i don't think it's turbo failiure as this has only come about whilst sitting in traffic,i'm not sure though if it could be something like the oil feed pipe being lose or maybe the oil return,i'm guessing at the moment as i'm not 100% sure of the set up.Wasn't sure if anyone else has had a similar problem?
Any suggestions would help as the car was supposed to be going out of town tmorow and now i've got to mess about getting it to subaru.

is it a new car? could be the wax on the engine as i had if it is

Its 2000 classic,don't think it could be wax,smells of oil with oil smoke.cheers anyway.

Could be oil leaking from one of the rocker covers and dropping onto the exhaust manifold. I had this on a 1995 WRX. When sat in traffic it was very noticable. Fixed it by changing the rocker cover gaskets.

Muncher

If its near the turbo this thread mite help :)

Oil Leak Near Turbo

Mine has done this for ages. Doesn't lose any oil though and Subaru said it wasn't the rockers so they don't wanna know...


Andy

I also had the same problem on MY95

Changed rocker gasket covers and problem sorted

How ironic that your Scoobynet name is Burnz and you have a smokin' problem :)

it will be the rocker gasket, probably the drivers side

got the same problem with my my95,stiv2 rocker gasket so i'm told quite common not to pricey!! mine is booked in at scoobyclinic next week!! just check for oil spots on your drive drivers side.

Had the same problem on my MY98 UK - Rocker cover gasket was leaking onto exhaust, although Subaru couldn't tell me that !

T