Any car savvy people around?

[EverythingYouDoIsaBalloon]

So my car's been standing in the drive for the past 2 months as I've been recovering from a shoulder fracture. Started it up a couple of weeks ago, white smoke coming out of the exhaust. Assumed it was because the car had been standing a while (probably should have been starting it up from time to time, but didn't think of it at the time). Injury not sufficiently healed at that point so didn't attempt to drive.

I came to start it and reverse it out of my driveway today, white smoke again, quite a bit of it. Hadn't stopped after a couple of minutes. By this point I was too nervous to drive the car so haven't been able to test whether the smoke would disperse if I kept the engine running.

Car had a new exhaust earlier this year so I'd be surprised if it was a problem with that.

Going to get my garage to check the car for good measure, obviously, but in the meantime I was wondering if anyone knows if this is common in cars that have been left standing for a longish period of time? TIA...

I thought it was because a head gasket has gone? Or coolant is leaking somewhere?

It could be anything from starting from cold to a blown head gasket.

Check under your oil cap for a mayonnaise like substance. That's an indicator of head gasket failure.

If that's fine I would run it for a bit longer, let it heat up properly and get rid of any condensation lying within. Hopefully the smoke will disappear.

Are you 100% it's coming from the exhaust?
After a couple of months plenty of things can seize up and cause smoke to come out the back. Brake calipers for one.

Brake calipers for one.

I think we can be certain it’s not a seized caliper🤣

OP, are you certain it’s smoke and not steam? How long did you have it running? Did you rev it at all or just let it idle? Any strange noises?

As PP said, check the oil filler cap for mayo and also check the oil on the dipstick for both colour and level. Check the coolant level and colour as well. If all looks good then start it again, maybe rev it gently to 2-3k rpm.

Assuming it was running fine when parked it’s hard to imagine something serious happening whilst standing for 2 months but not impossible I guess.

Thanks everyone, this is all really helpful. It's definitely coming from the exhaust. Going to check the oil cap shortly, and if that looks OK will try starting it up again/leaving it running for a bit. Keeping everything crossed it's not the head gasket!! gulp

Like others have said, leave it running for a while in case it’s condensation.
Otherwise head gasket is a good shout. Head gasket isn’t a disaster. I’ve had a couple of those go, and it wasn’t massively expensive to fix. I did one of them myself!

Thanks all. Thankfully no mayo and the white smoke/steam dispersed after running the engine for a couple of minutes. Everything else seems fine, so hopefully I'm OK!