Knocking sound in early morning only.

Hey all,
I have had my truck since October 2005. Test drove it with 15 miles on it and now it has almost 196,000!

I have been through many seasons with this thing and have always kept up on maintenance. I have a great mechanic and have only had to do spark plugs, breaks, belt and new idler pulley's. I live in MD and temperatures have been low as of late. I leave at 5am for work every morning and heard a slight knocking, but with the last two start ups I have not? My mechanic is slammed right now and I don't want to freak out for nothing.

I have been talking to some folks at work and they seem to think it may be a bad batch of gas? I have been putting regular in my truck since day one. I just wanted some advice on whether I should switch to mid grade? Some folks says it matters and others do not? I understand that my truck is getting older, but if there is anything I can do help get this thing to 300,000 I am all about it. Thanks for your time.

 

Doubt you have anything to worry about. It's been seriously cold, oil gets a little thicker, it takes an extra couple seconds to build pressure and fill passages. I'd give it a couple minutes after starting before driving. Other than that I'd wait till more seasonable temps to see if things return to normal before chasing anything.

 

Thank you!

 

Hello, Kace. Welcome to TW.

Are you pretty sure the knocking is the type that is caused by pre-ignition (pinging), or could it be an internal noise like rod knocking? Or could it be the famous “Tacoma tick“ (assuming you have the 4.0L V6)? Does it go away almost immediately, or slowly as the engine warms up? We’ll just want to be clear about the nature of the noise you’re hearing before making too many comments.

 

Living at 10K feet in the Rockies, it hit double digit -0° regularly. In really cold weather, engine oil thickens and has trouble flowing. That's what caused the knocking. It's not good for the motor, keep it to a minimum if you can. There's actually electric oil heaters for this.
I've been in weather cold enough to turn manual transmission fluid to jello, unable to put the truck into gear.

 

Thank you for responding. It does slow as the engine heats up. It is a V6 4.0 auto transmission. It is in the pre-ignition stage that I am hearing this.

 

Like my grandmom always said do not worry until there is something to worry about. I am glad to have all of the experience and knowledge from all forum members as a resource. Thank you to those who responded. We all have busy lives and I appreciate taking time out of your day to help ease my mind

 

There's a reason many motors, including the 4.0L 1GR-FE, have a spot near the bottom for a block heater to be installed.

https://www.google.com/search?q=tacomaworld+block+heater+site:www.tacomaworld.com

 

Great advice. So helpful. Thank you.

 

winter and summer fuel have different ethanol levels, so that's why you might be experiencing knock

 

Hard to diagnosis across the web, but are you sure it's engine knock? I know it's a pretty common issue to have some rubbing and vibration around the intake pipe where it penetrates through the frame near the passenger wheel well. I had some vibrating/knockingish sound on mine years ago that only occurred when it was cold, I ended up just needing to adjust the intake pipe and add some foam around it to keep it from rubbing.

Probably not your issue, but something to double check... maybe?

 

my 99 had piston slap that sounded like a knock when really cold out
it lasted 190k until i traded it in for bad frame

Moms 74 Nova I6 had same thing when new, lasted 160k until I hit a tree with it

Let it warm up and go easy on throttle until warm

 

Geez, my taco with 215+ sounds louder in cold starts, but the coldest it gets around here is mid 40’s, for, like one week a year. I can only imagine what it would be like for you guys in the N40+ latitude; Im at N32.