Last night parked my 2004 Ford F150 after a 15 minute drive in 85 degree weather. About 15 minutes after parking I heard a loud boom and a cloud if smoke came out from the front of my truck. Lots of people on the street also saw it and said they thought it was a tire but alas, all tires are fine and oddly a look under the hood showed zero signs of anything unusual, no leaks under and I even drove it home with no perceived problems.
Anybody have any ideas what this could be or what to look out for?
It sounds like you were punked. That was unusual behavior from a major appliance. It leaves you with a difficult decision. Should you call a mechanic or the police? Darned if I know.
I had an AC compressor fail catastrophically a few years ago, and it made a loud noise. It had its own belt, and didn’t affect the engine operation
When I popped the hood, it was pretty evident what happened, because the AC belt was gone, and the compressor was frozen, because it let go in a bad way
Back in the 1950s, there were these harmless bombs that could be wired to the starter circuit of a car and would blow when the driver hit the starter. There would be a big boom and a lot of smoke, but no damage. It was a common prank at the school where my mother taught She had one wired to her car, but it didn’t go off when she started the car. However, she was passing a big truck and the bomb suddenly went off. She knew right away what it was and kept right on going. However, when she glanced in her rear view mirror, the truck driver had pulled off the pavement and was checking his tires.