94, engines pings when it has a load on it.

[srf64]

need some help? tried everything, different gas, octane levels, cleaners and nothing seems to help. ford shop said that they would find out the problem at 95.00 dollars an hour. said it could take 3 to 5 hours. the 94 runs great. it has 173,000 on it. 23 mpg highway. never has the check engine light come on. any help would be nice.

 

[Creager]

Pinging is pretty normal, pretty much impossible to eliminate entirly.

1) Clean yr MAF with some Carb/Choak cleaner.

2) You said you tried different octane. Octane has a lot to do with it, my truck pings like ping pong machine when i use 87. 89 the pinging is non existant

3) the other thing would be SEAFOAM. i was pinging a lil bit, ran a 1/3 can of seafoam through it and BOOM pinging is gone. But you gotta do it like... every oil change to stay on top of it.

 

[rookieshooter]

Just curious, have you changed octane level one way or the other? Have you tried adding an octane booster? I know this is not a fix, but if it did not ping anymore after adding additive that might help solve the problem. Try cleaning the Maf air sensor. this sends info to the PCM to calculate the air/gas ratio

 

[srf64]

thanks for the replies. the tips are to be useful. see ya later. srf64.

 

[metstalker]

hey, ive invested alot of time and money into fixing my ping problem but no solution. i have a taken off my throttle body and saw that the whole intake had about a 1/16 inch layer of carbon built up on the back of the throttle body and proably the rest of the assembly. you have alot of miles and i would bet your problem could be caused by that. but getting it fixed if your not too good at taking engines apart is the problem for me. good luck

 

[B-Liner]

My 94xlt had the same problem. I took it to the shop and they said three of the valve lifters were sticking shut. Increased octane level and ran Amsoil engine fllush before an oil change, this helped quiet the noise indefinetly.

 

[BigBadWimp]

You could always try everybody's favorite: SEAFOAM!!! (music plays, choirs sing)

 

[prozachappy]

My 94 pinged for years, especially when pulling a travel trailer and/or when punching it on the freeway. Was very annoying...the faster you go the louder! Like above, when I ran a higher octane it was pretty much non-exsistant. I tried all the quick fixes..ie seafoam, FI pressure flush, octane boosters etc... All were just temp fix to a larger problem. I ran 93 until gas prices were so high I could not afford that anymore. What finally fixed the pinging was...
I changed my original fuel injectors @ 165,000 miles when I pulled the upper intake off there was a layer of thick carbon "icing" completely coating the inside of the TB, the upper intake manifold, and the lower ports. Even after all the seafoam treatments and FI flushes that were "suppose" to burn off the excess carbon! I soaked and scrubed the TB and upper intake, and then using a shop vac and dental tools I removed as much from the inside of the ports as I could. I was friggin amazed at the amount of build-up in there.
So long story short....I killed two birds with one stone not sure which (new injectors or cleaning the upper intake manifold) helped to eliminate my pinging...but either way I can now run 87 octane again and haven't heard "PING" in close to a year now!

 

[Rhett]

I changed my original fuel injectors @ 165,000 miles when I pulled the upper intake off there was a layer of thick carbon "icing" completely coating the inside of the TB, the upper intake manifold, and the lower ports. Even after all the seafoam treatments and FI flushes that were "suppose" to burn off the excess carbon!

That's carbon varnish. And Sea Foam treatments really don't penetrate and remove it. Best way to remove it is to do what you did, scrub and scrape and scrub. Seafoam helps in the combustion chamber though; in there there's enough heat and pressure to knock the carbon loose. But not in the intake manifold...

 

[metstalker]

thats what i need to do how hard is it to take off the upper manifold

 

[prozachappy]

not hard at all. just be sure your gasket seats and lines up properly when you put it back on. I did the fuel injectors while I was in there, but if your just going to take apart and clean the upper intake it shouldn't take you more than a few hours.
It's really just the intake bolts, the vaccum lines, and the TB...oh and the DPFE sensor and EGR tube if you have one. Just label all your bolts and hoses with tape so you remember the proper order.
You will need:
Haynes manual for torc specs and tightening order
Torc wrench
Upper intake manifold gasket
TB gasket
Carb cleaner or brake cleaner
Good wire brush, maybe a dental pick
Lots of elbow grease

also scraped and cleaned my ports (which were nasty with carbon build-up)
You need to remove the fuel rail and injectors if your going to clean those. Again, not hard...just more time consuming. But man what a difference it made on my '94' ! I doubt the upper intake had ever been removed and cleaned. Like I said been able to run 87 octane with no ping ever since
Good Luck, J.

 

[Creager]

thats what i need to do how hard is it to take off the upper manifold

not has hard as you think. Just make sure you use clean tools, clean hands, and make sure NOTHING gets in the engine.

and get a good manual that will describe what to do.

you can take your heads to get 'hot bathed,' usually goes a long way to getting all the crud off...

Ill be removing my heads next week, i got new pushrods/rockerarms/lifters and springs on the way. Hopefully the bottom of the engine wont need much work hehe.

 

[metstalker]

the farthest ive gotten was taking the TB off and the back of the flip disk was full of carbon build up so i guess ill look forward to doing that this thanksgiving

 

[Rhett]

the farthest ive gotten was taking the TB off and the back of the flip disk was full of carbon build up so i guess ill look forward to doing that this thanksgiving

Not somethin to look forward to...

If you're a slow mechanic like me, your truck will be down for a weekend when you do the cleaning upper manifold job. Good thing is you should only have to do it once every 100,000 miles, ehheheh. If you want to, you could also clean the spacer that fits below the upper intake man. and even go as far as the lower intake manifold. Of course then you'd want to re-do your gasket, etc. and that's yet more time and work.

 

[metstalker]

yeah this will be quite a job.. with 230 000 miles of buildup im gonne plan for the explorer to be down for at least 4 days

 

[410Fortune]

The upper intake manifold can be off in 15 minutes if you have done it before, an hour working very slow.

Does your truck have a high idle?

I suspect the upper intake manifold is loose, check the torque on the 10mm bolts, Most 91-94 OHV's I have seen, these bolts are loose as a goose. A quick tighten can solve the ping issue.

 

[metstalker]

yeah but when i pulled the tb off there was alot of carbon buildup on the inside of it so logic would say thats covering everything inside the upper intake manifold so i think i just need to get under there and clean everything up. its not that im slow im just cautious about ruining anything since its my only ride

i dont think its has a high idle but it pings like hell

 

[410Fortune]

caarbon buildup and oil in the intake is normal.

Yes you can clean the intake and IAC and TB, but the carbon in the intake is not causing the pinging. to get carbon off the pistons and valves you need sea foam, the stuff works wonders.

The upper intake manifold gets loose, trust me, when it does it leaks air.
More air in the intake and combustion chamber then the computer is expecting (based on signal from MAS and position of TPS) = PING.

 

[prozachappy]

Yes build up is normal, but there comes a point where it begins to effect performance. Loose bolts could very well be it, that is def a very common problem with the first gens
...but if like me he can run a higher octane and the pinging then goes away...then it is probably not loose intake bolts. I checked and tightened my upper's on many occasions as well as did leak tests on it...wasn't the sorce of my pinging. Pinging is basically detonation and/or pre-ignition from the air/fuel mixture cause by...compression ratio, engine timing, mixture temperature and ratio, cylinder pressure and so forth. Since our timings are fix we can't back off the spark advance...what else can help resist detonation. Lots of little small things...for me it just so happened that new fuel injectors and the the removal of 10 years of carbon did the job Not saying it will fix everyones pinging issues...but it could help.

 

[410Fortune]

it cant hurt, the upper intake actually flows really well as far as stock intakes go. Carbon will build up in the passeges to the EGR and IAC valve, but not enough inside the intake runners to do much harm. If you have ALOT of oil and carbon in there you should check/replace the PCV valve.

Sea Foam (couple cans, two tanks of gas) will get rid of much of the carbon built up on the pistons, in the combustion chamber, etc.

Lifter tapping is sometimes mistaken for pinging as well, these engines are notorious for poor lubrication on the upper end (especailly the rearmost cyl) sythn oil can really help with this as well as sea foam or similar inthe crankcase for a few thousand miles. Worn lifters,pushrods, and valvetrain is pretty common. The heads/valve train are the weak part (as far as longevity, not strength) of these engines.


OHV's when cared for last well over 250K miles.
Compression test can be done to determine ring seal and a fuel rail leak down test can help find leaking injectors.
I have seen OHV blocks with over 200K miles apart, you can still see factory hone marks on the cyl walls, the lower end and short block will go forever in most cases...