2012 v6 at DCSB engine knocking @ 1500 rpm

I'm pretty sure that's what you told me in the other thread. I bought the NGK iridium direct replacement (heat range '6') for the truck, tried them with no luck. The service mgr. did advise me to remove them if I still had them in. Not because they are bad, but because he asked if I'd be willing to let my truck be a guinea pig for Toyota corporate. I said yes, so he said to make it 100% stock - factory air filter (already is), Toyota oil filter (already is), and factory plugs (already did that this past weekend since the iridiums did not help). If the FTS folks see non-Toyota parts in your junk, they get cranky.

Really starting to buy into the carbon buildup theory here. If the Iridium plugs can remove a little more heat from the combustion chamber, they will help, if you're right on the edge of things. Too much carbon, and they can't cool things down enough. Same for using 91 vs 87. 91 helps some, probably those with lesser deposits. 93 helps beyond that. Some folks may have too much carbon to be helped by octane in the 91-93 range.

With winter coming, odds are this will die down for many people. First, they put butane back in the gasoline and second cooler temps can help keep the cylinder temps down a few degrees (colder air, some external airflow cooling, etc.)

For my part, I'll probably contact Ron @ Piercey sometime in mid-October (about a month from now) to check in.

 

I hear Seafoam mentioned a few times to clean engines, mostly posted by 1st Gen owners. I wonder if that will help.

 

I'm not convinced that carbon build up is the cause.

1. If that was the case, wouldn't the dual vvt 4.0s be susceptible? (heck, every other car on the road as well) Everyone would be pinging. (I have never heard of the 10+ FJs complain about pinging.)

2. From my experience dealing with high performance vehicles, if one of them started to ping carbon buildup was not anywhere on the radar as the root cause. It was either timing or octane. Change one of those variables and the ping should disappar.

 

Not a shot in hell any thing that new is has enough carbon buildup to cause any problems they can try that line again at about 190K and even then it's doubtful.

 

You're right, as soon as I posted it I thought about that.

My truck was pinging before it hit 30k miles, just like many others reading this thread.

This reminds me of the early GM LS engines that had a noticeable tick on cold startups. They attributed it to "carbon buildup" when later on it was discovered to be a design flaw.

Carbon buildup is an easy scapegoat for manufacturers and dealerships.

 

I've got 17k miles on my 2013 4.0L V6.
Up here at 7500 ft elevation it does not ping one bit - even lugging it uphill.

All I ever run in it is the base 86 octane that's available at this elevation. Drive down to Dallas (which is ~ 650 ft elevation) and run 87 octane there and still no ping at all.

I also floor it quite a bit to pass slow traffic going up these hills around here. It is definitely not babied.

 

That's not really surprising at all. Here's why.

Air pressure at 7500 feet is much lower than near sea level. Therefore, cylinder pressures are lower (less air = less oxygen, which means the computer is going to feed the engine less gas). In turn, the A/F mix has to be at a certain pressure to ignite properly, which means timing gets dialed back, and since it's starting off at a lower pressure, combustion-ignition is going to be less likely. Ergo, no pingy-dingy.

At sea level, unless you stick around for a while, the computer is going to work with the stored timing retard values. Eventually it'll advance the timing to the ragged edge. You may or may not ping, it depends on too many conditions (and some unknowns) to be sure.

 

Brandon, you've always sounded like you know WTF you're talking about, so I'll share a little of what I've come across.

I've found plenty of instances of MY10 and newer vehicles, from *many* manufacturers, having spark knock issues. Nissan, Mazda, VW, Audi, BMW, Ford, GM you name it. Some have been older than MY10, too - found a few non-Toyota as far back as '07MY.

If you poke around on the Tundra forums, folks with the 4.7 were having similar issues as early as 2004/2005. Then there are other Toyotas doing this that have GR-family engines (RAVs, some Lexus-y things, some FJ's). I admit it does not seem as rampant among the other brands or the other Toyota models, but the problem is out there.

I really think this is more related to EPA and CARB rules and running things at the bleeding edge of fuel economy. Sure, if you want MPG, don't buy a truck/SUV - that was my plan. Then I got stuck using the truck as a DD, and started being really conservative with the Go-Fast pedal. Add to that plenty of stop-n-go traffic, and I'm sure you've got a recipe for carbon build up.

I peered at my cylinder tops when I pulled those plugs the other day. They were pretty caked in carbon. It seemed excessive to me for a 16.5k truck. My '04 with almost 70k was way cleaner, but it also saw higher RPMs more often.

For now I'm running 91, trying to keep the RPMs up, and doing a few WOT pulls when I can to/from work to try and clean things out a bit. If I hear ping, I back off - otherwise I keep the foot in it.

In the end, I dunno. All guesswork here. Gotta wait for Toyota to sort this out.

 

It's NOT carbon build up. My truck has been doing it since it was new off the lot with 3 miles. Therefor it puts your theory of "driving your truck hard" to rest. Next.

 

I have the same problem with a 2013 Double cab. It has approx. 12,000 km's on it was pinging noticeably when climbing hills. I drive to work in the early morning (0630 hrs) so no high temps, speed approx. 90 km/hr.

With 87 octane I get pinging, with 91 octane I don't.

 

I have 2010 with 44,xxx miles on it that has had the same issue for about the last 5000 miles or so. I ran the last oil change (Mobil synthetic 5w-30) for the last ~7500 miles and just changed it. That combined with mid-grade gas seems to make the problem go away for now. Subscribing for hope of a future TSB to take care of this problem.

My guess would be that it is a tuning issue related to attempting to get every last little bit of fuel economy out of the engine for EPA tests but ends up not being that great for the engine.

 

Hey, I was wondering if the noise any of you are hearing sounds like the one I have in this clip.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/4xw08qop1qio4np/Video 9-23-2013, 5 33 20 PM.mov

Its not the normal Toyota ticking or the fan but the other clatter noise in the background (sorry about the poor quality) . I took this clip pretty much immediately after I started up the truck and while it was idling. It did it several times today and, of course, now I am at home and have the ability to get underneath it, it wont make the noise again and my boyfriend thinks I am crazy! The only difference from today is the temperature outside, its about 7 degrees Celsius right now and today it was about 18-20 degrees Celsius. If it happens again tomorrow I will try and get a better audio clip. Thanks!

 

I am not a tech savvy car guy. After reading a few responses and comments on here this is what I did. I removed the positive battery terminal overnight put it back on in the morning. I drove the truck like I stole it for my 45 minute commute. Extremely hard acceleration getting up to speed. To be honest I never pushed this truck at all. I drove it like a little old lady. I figured if I spent $30k on a car I want it to last and tried to keep it like new. Anyway I parked it and went to work. Ditto for the ride home. After that I could not replicate the pinging noise that has been torturing me for the last 10k miles. Like I said I do not know very much about cars other than general maintenance and maybe there are other reasons that it ran differently yesterday. It was a little cooler yesterday but not much. I still had the 87 octane in the tank that I drove around with the service advisor with and it was pinging like crazy then. Maybe there is something to this computer issue. I had an 08 Silverado and my mechanic had the battery out for a few hours. It ran like crap when I first drove it home. The truck would buck and stall until I gave it a 15 min drive and reset the computer. Regardless I am trading this truck in today. I don't have the patience to wait until toyota works this problem out....if they work it out. Other than the pinging and engine problem I will miss the comfortable ride and its good looks. The frontier I am getting is not as sharp looking but seems to have comparable ride quality and more torque.

 

One bothersome thing is that Toyota isn't hiding behind the "light pinging is OK" sentence in the manual. They would if they could, but they must figure this is damaging something, which is why they are trying to fix it.

Workarounds (temporary) would involve a richer fuel mixture:

1. Cooler thermostat (TRD did this for 1st gen S/C trucks with ping, it helped).
2. Trick ECU into thinking more air is coming in. It'll add fuel to the mix. Involves
dicking with the MAF.
3. Same as above, but with the coolant temp. sensor.
4. Make the ECU think the intake air temp is lower and the air is denser, so it'll add
more fuel.
5. Intercept ECU signals and manually control timing retard ($$$ for parts)
6. Hope the return to winter blend gas helps - they put more butane in it which is
more volatile but has a higher octane rating. Pump octane remains, but the
ignition characteristics of the fuel change significantly.

 

What I would like to know is what do those of us with "good", non ping engines have in common? My 09 has 31,000 miles on it now, it's a daily driver in all types of conditions. I don't baby it, and until this summer I've used regular gas. I have been putting premium in it since about june, maybe a single mpg higher with premium and maybe a little smoother.

Just curious if there's anything in common with the good engines, since it seems like the pinging engines are all over the place.

 

I live down here in S. Florida where its still in the 90'S during the day. Once the engine is up to temp. with the air on, it pings like crazy on any brand 87 I use. My question to the more knowlegeable members, will I eventually cause any engine damage continuing to let it ping? When I first start the engine in the morning, it runs great, with no pinging, but again when up to temp. it starts again. It really bothers me that Toyota is not upfront and forthcoming regarding this issue. As I previously mentioned in an older reply, I tried the Denso Iridiums, but it didn't help at all. I really like the truck otherwise!

 

It might simply be fuel.

My 2012 2.7 doesn't ping one bit on regular 87 octane pump gas. In California we pay a lot for gas, but it's a good blend tailored to our hot climate.

 

Yeah, but I'm in California and mine pings like a SOB. I'm pretty sure the formulations for you and for me in the Bay Area are the same, if not damn close. The change to/from butane content shouldn't impact this.

If this was just a 2011+ problem, I'd say Toyota had some sort of undetected defect in the engines or this is the result of a running change. But with this stretching back to 2005 trucks, I don't buy that.

Timing retard will fix it, as will higher octane (for some). But neither is the proper fix. I still think it's in software and has to do with VVTi management or a combination of VVTi management and timing advance. I wish I could switch VVTi off and try driving on 87. My hands are too big to reach the spool valve connectors, though.

Someone with lady hands and the ping, go pull your VVTi connectors and drive around with 87!!

 

needs moar boost

 

Here, if anyone wants to contribute to a dataset:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/L7XZ8QP