smoke coming from under cowl

Might want to check your radiator and all your hoses.... I know I over looked a bit of "steam" coming out of my 4 cyl one time, next thing I know, overheated and blew the head gasket.

Got a breather? I've seen some of those smoke up pretty bad. Mine doesnt, but thats just me.

As opposed to a normal PCV return system and an oil filler cap.

Zeus, are these related?
http://forums.stangnet.com/showthread.php?t=450207

if so, i would pursue the wiring. good luck.

do you have any oil leaks or blowby,how about from you brake pads, do you use them to hard or something.

I hope you've got a sealed/vented battery case (the other thread) - the battery gives off fumes that are both toxic and explosive during charging. As for smoke in the cowl area - are you sure your heater core/hoses are not leaking? Is it smoke or steam? Electrical-wise -- most people don't realize that the secret to all things electric is that they run on smoke - the bigger the wire, the more "smoke" it carries. If you let the smoke "out" of the wires or the electrical devices themselves, they won't work anymore.

Michael, LOL.
Zeus: you would be amazed by how much smoke a drop of oil will create. when i lost a KKK turbo seal on a Porsche, i was getting equivalent to about a drop of oil in the exhaust side of the turbo and it smoked like a banshee. even a hot motor (not necessarily even the exhaust) will burn a drop of oil, and let off some smoke. same for coolant. does it smell like burning oil? how about burning coolant (each has its own distinct odor)?

might want to get it to do it again, park somewhere dark, and get a flashlight out. try to trace where the fumes are coming from.

shaking wheel: is it the front wheels? might be out of balance wheels/tires. some have gotten similar symptoms with gears and stock driveshaft (seems to exacerbate imbalance).

my two cents worth. good luck.

Porsche Turbo's? You been holdin' out on me......

Check the back of the intake manifold, and check the back of the valve covers. The motors are notorious for leaking out the back of the valve covers, and it drips down the back of the heads, bell housing, etc. See how tight your valve cover bolts are. If they are loose, try tightening them up and see what happens.

Zeus: best bet would be to clean it up real well, and then start it up and watch for where you see contamination. they sell dyes to look for leaks, but given the location of your leak, i would think seeing anything could be problematic.

it can be hard to pin point leaks like that since in driving, the turbulence of the air can fling oil all over. hence the test above. good luck.
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Michael, dont get me started on that Porsche. got it with 12K miles. had a bad turbo seal at about 14K. dealer swapped it under warranty. then went through 2 more sets of turbo seals by the time i sold it at 25K miles. the return line was poorly engineered (almost a flat run back to the sump) and coked up quite a bit. air/oil cooled turbo also cooked the oil, leaving me little pressure (oil light came on at one bar). back then, i was not savvy enough to run an oil cooler. Mobil 1 was fairly new, and did not help much. i even ran 50 wt once.
i would have converted to an independant oiling system with a turbo timer were i to do it again.

and dont get me started on the external wastegate. i got a bad rattle and thought i broke off the platinum, palladium, rhodium in the cat. get in there and find that the waste gate shaft had worked the seat and gotten some slop (so that as exhaust pulses went by it chattered the "door" on the wastegate). take it out and have a shim machined for it. loads of fun. NOT.
that car was a pain, but what a great road car. and back then, the Pirelli P7's were very pricey. the whole car was expensive.

power was the engine good, then start it up look for the oil, try a can of that stope leak stuff for a bit then do and oil change.