hours of work and nothing, seafoam = crap, new ngk plugs

[phillipguru]

Ok over the past week i have replaced the tranny fluid, full case of type 4, power steering fluid and diff fluid. The car runs great except the tps is adjusted too low and the screws are mangled, and i have a low speed 1200 rpm light throttle pinging.

so going cheap route first i picked up a can of seafoam from napa to see if the pinging was carbon buildup over 150k miles. I used 1/3 the can slowly let the pcv hose suck it up. The car stalled after a bit waited the 5 minutes cranked it and it ran like crap for a few minutes, cleared up. one thing that really caught my attention was that the seafoam smoke was comming out behind the manifold from down low, maybe i have a crack in my exhuast somewhere. the smoke cleared up and i put some of the sea foam in the crank and in the tank. the car ran like crap, so i went and filled it up with premium it took 9 gallons. After a few miles the car ran better EXCEPT the low rpm 1200-1500 ping was now mega loud and 1000-2800 rpm. I though about it and the seafoam probably killed the plugs.

So i went and bought a set of NGK plugs. Put them in. Reset the ecu.

Drove for a few miles and the car was mega torqy had gobs of power. as i got home and had cars and walls for the motor noise to bounce off of the low rpm ping is there. Its not even as bad or loud as it was before the seafoam and its harder to replicate but its still there.

So i put it in P and reved the motor a few times, after about the 4th time reving it to 3500 and let go of the throttle it almost stalled out.

Im not sure what to think now. The car is running with more power definitely. Do you guys think since my idle is low from the tps not being adjusted correctly thats why reving the motor and letting off in neutral it dips down to 3-400 rpm and idles back up to 500-550. I know this is too low an idle but i am stil trying to get those screws off. Tomarrow i'll goto the hardware store and pick them up. Or do you think the ping and low idle are related.Im not sure what to make of this. Other than that the car is very strong.

 

[phillipguru]

Well i just got the tps screws off, somehow i just put my bodyweight into the screw and both of them turned, i put the better one on top and left the mangled one off. The car now idles at 700 perfectly, the pinging still present though. maf has already been cleaned, that was my first guess. car does feel alot strong at mid range now, just that ping is haunting hah

 

[Peewee]

Can you describe the pinging sound you hear?

I didn't think a car could run lean enough at idle to audibly ping.

Might be worth getting the fuel ratio's checked with a wideband o2 sensor.


Pinging is either caused by too much air, or not enough fuel.
Which means major air leak. or major fuel blockage.

 

[phillipguru]

It sounds like metalic roughness of the motor at 1200-1500 rpm only under light throttle. Yeah i wouldnt think it would ping at that low an rpm and still pull hard and smooth to redline. Its almost a clacking sound. I had a buddy who knows more than I about engines and has turbod his car he confirmed it to be a pinging at 1200 as well.

 

[phillipguru]

i'll do the oil change asap

Update : went to home depot on my lunch with the screw in hand. I looked at the chart and the dummy holes, the stock screw is a 4.7mm size. Unfortunetly they didnt have the correct size i got the closest in standard size and tryed it , didnt fit. So i'm out $1.08, I'll hit the ace hardware on the way home. I know my tps is working fine but i cant tighten it down enough to not go out of adjustment. I was idling at 1300 when i got back from my home depot excursion.

 

[Red Supra]

Check your egr system, a leak in the EGR will make the engine ping a slight bit at lights loads which is when the ecu commands the egr to open.