TKS Smoke?

[Bolter]

During a longer flight, in and out of cold clouds for the last 1.5 to 2 hours, I had run the TKS a fair amount.  Proactively, or it worked as a protective coating, as I never picked up ice.  Regardless, it was run for more fluid than any previous flight.  When parking the plane, I noticed smoke coming from the cowling.  Not a burning oil or fuel smell, and no particular color, like it was steam.  Today I opened up the cowlings and found no visible problems, burn marks, smoke stains, etc.  Could not recreate the smoke with ground running, either. 

One possiblity is that it was TKS fluid blowing back into the engine and accumulated enough that it was boiling off when I parked.  Are more experienced TKS users seeing that after longer flights?

@CAV Ice might also have some practical comments on this, so adding him here.  

[Fritz1]

landed with the system running once, temp below freezing, forgot to turn off after landing but no smoke after shutdown, makes sense that the TKS fluid evaporating would produce a smoke plume under certain temp / dewpoint conditions but never seen it

[Fly Boomer]

I think it was Maxwell who told me that in flight, that stuff goes everywhere, so it would not surprise me if enough got around the engine somewhere and was burning or steaming off.

[exM20K]

@Bolter that is common and nothing to be concerned with. It is excess fluid steaming off.

-dan

[Bolter]

2 hours ago, exM20K said:

@Bolter that is common and nothing to be concerned with. It is excess fluid steaming off.

-dan

Good to know.