2012 Tacoma...Last cry for help b4 it goes!

^Exactly. I think he's saying he's hearing pinging and knocking? I find that hard to believe. Unless he legitimately got a lemon and three different dealers refuse to honor it and don't want to deal with the lemon laws...

 

Lol right? I hear a noise and I'm like "I knooooowwwww, just hold on for a little bit longer, we'll get you fixed!"

 

You got that right. Hard to have a heart in it when it sounds like a heart attack. FYI, Its not the Taco tick.

 

Lol. I'm the same way. "Shhhh I know it hurts, I'm sorry!!"

 

"look i know i shoulve put gas in you but if you can hold out for just a bit longer i promise i'll pump premium this time!"

 

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I would change the plugs first ... then look at injection system ... then maybe fuel & charcoal filters ...

Different dealers are like different girl friends/wives & etc ... they are VERY different in their solutions sometimes ...

Good luck and for the record, I have had many Toyotas and have never been thrown under the bus by Toyota (had some tough words with dealers & corporate, but NO bus tracks on my back) ...

At least you have NOT been called a "troll" yet ... oops, perhaps that was the "kiss of death" for one of the "cheeeezze diques" on here ..
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Thanks man, Ill try out a better plug if I do not get the response I am looking from Toyota. Worse case Ill just trade it in. I have already accepted the fact that I will be paying a car note my whole life since I can never stick with the same vehicle for too long~

 

Put 93 in and be done with it.

Why someone would spend 30K on a truck and then refuse to spend an extra 40 cents a gallon on better fuel is beyond me.

 

I run 87 through my truck all the time and it runs like a clock plus I get bout 300-320 a tank just doing mixed driving so I think 87 octane must be different quality throughout the states or you must be buying crappy gas

 

My truck pings on 87.
My brakes squeak every now and then.
Sometimes my dash rattles.
Sometimes my A/C chirps.

It's a truck, it won't be as plush or quiet as a BMW. But I wouldn't trade it for anything else out right now.

 

^You totally got a lemon. Better change it out quick, before it explodes.

 

I wish there was some way to manually mess with the timing in these trucks. The noise that folks describe as pinging doesn't really sound like pinging (to me). I base this on having messed with timing on my old AMC 258 and inducing spark knock at rattle to take my advance to the limit for more power. It just doesn't sound the same, at all.

Watching on the scangauge when I do something on purpose to induce ping on the Tacoma (uphill, 5th gear, light throttle, A/C on), the sound isn't quite the same, and the SG shows the computer retarding timing prior to the 5th/locked->4 downshift. The truck can drop the timing back pretty far - I've seen timing drop to -4 or -5 under some circumstances (truck wasn't pinging). Heading up to the mountains last weekend, in 5th and goosing the throttle enough to increase the throttle position, but not enough to make the truck downshift, I could again see the timing drop back (in the +12 range) and hear a slight ping. Once the foot got a little more into it, the truck would downshift and *then* I would more loudly hear what people are reporting as a ping/knock. Timing advance was anywhere between +17 and +20 - so not all the way into the advance curve, but not so incredibly retarded, either.


This tells me the ECU maps and the knock sensor are doing their jobs. Before you lecture me on altitude, this was on the way *up* to the mountains, not *in* the mountains. We're talking grades between 500 and 1500 ft. ASL. In other words, atmospheric pressure was still in the 14 PSI range (compare to 6500+ feet where you're seein 10.x PSI).


I have no idea what's going on in that engine. Is it load causing timing chain rattle, perhaps as VVT-i changes valve timing? Is it something in the exhaust headers (which up until today, I did not realize, on the 1GR-FE, are integrated with the upstream cats!)? Maybe it's an oil pressure issue. Oddly I did note at cold starts the 90915-20004 filter would let my oil light flicker for <1 second (Been using the -20004 for about 13k miles, this is the first time it has done that). I pulled it off and put a -YZZD3 and made up the lost oil, and no more oil light flicker. Is there a run of bad oil pumps?


Of course, this is all musing on my part - I don't have the desire to tear down a brand new engine. And this of course doesn't cover anything having to do with the damn A750 1->2 hard shift issue so many Tacoma folks bitch about (I'm one of them). Keep in mind if you have THAT problem, Toyota put out a TSB for the 10-12 4Runner (exact same issue), and left the Tacoma owners high and dry.


These trucks have problems. I'd expect no better (and probably much worse) from most other truck brands. I'll buy the extended warranty and drive it until it falls apart, rusts apart or outright dies. Good thing I don't give two shits about the driveline vibration issue.

 

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... ^ ^ ^ ... VERY well said from a MENSA point of view ... ... (probably too much "brain food info" for some of this group though ) ...

 

What is the percentage of ethanol that you are getting in your gas in your area? My 13 says not to go above 10% and that is what we have here in Virginia. I was told by the dealer I could run regular and I do unless I am making a long distance run. If you haven't tried it, if you disconnect the battery for about 10 minutes that should reset the onboard computer which might help.

 

Max allowable ethanol is 10%. No clue what it is here in Kommiefornia, but with all the Greenies, probably 11%.

BTW one suggestion I found on this forum that seems to have cured the ping on at least one truck - clean the MAF sensor. It takes 5 minutes and it can't hurt. Long before a dirty MAF will throw a code, it will give the ECU subpar air flow estimates.

I cleaned mine after my first reply, and the timing curve changed slightly. I'm now dropping 1-3 degrees of advance in the typical high gear/low throttle situation. This makes sense. The ECU adjusts fuel injector pulse width in PART based on air flow. I would bet beer that it also feeds this data to the transmission shifting maps too. Shifting was different after cleaning the MAF. Note I did not reset the ECU after cleaning. At 15k it seems early to clean the MAF, but I also spend lots of time on dusty roads.

It is worth the $7 for a can of MAF cleaner to try.

For the truly determined, you can also try availing yourself of arbitration. I used it years ago to get the manual trans changed out on my old 2002 Tacoma (notchy 1-2 shift).

If a particular truck runs better on 91 or 93 (best I see in CA is 91), spend the extra $6 per fill-up and be done with it.

 

posted before but never showed up... my last truck had similar problems, it was fuel related. here's what i used to do to keep it running smooth:

- clean the MAF
- clean the TB
- fresh plugs to rule that out
- run a tank full of StarTron treated gas, try 87 first

i used to do the MAF and TB every few thousand miles. the StarTron treatment (and sometimes Techron) i used to do about every 800mi.

worked for me. def helped with mild ping when accelerating from a stop. i was still using the same gas station too. (10% ethanol)

 

i agree. in my situation, running mid-grade (89 here) all the time is eventually what i did.