ticking noise at speed

[McBAIN Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close McBAIN]

Hi guys, i hit the road for Gympie today 170k's on the highway at speed. was running late for a meetup point so was not being light on the right foot. got to destination no probs, stopped for an hour or so for lunch, hit the road again and with the cruise set on about 108kmh putting along without any probs then there was a "tick" noise, would have been less than a second in length, with a momentary dip in power (minimal, at most the speed would have dropped to 105 then picked up again) looked back in the rear vision mirror to see a massive cloud of smoke. but then all returned to normal. no smoke, no problems with power, no noise.

about 20 k's later, it happened again, was only really doing just under 100, this time the noise was a bit longer, enough time for a "tickatick" power didn't drop as much, and no smoke.

both instances were on level roads, so not working too hard going up a hill or anything like that..

it's a little unnerving. anyone had anything similar or heard of anything like this?

[samo Addicted PP Member Find all posts View Profile Close samo]

i would be taking the playdo to a decent mechanic and getting it checked out ASAP before you do some real damage.

[damonat Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close damonat]

ooowwww
it doesn't sound good.
i'm with samo.
see someone asap, and try to not drive too far till you do.
it's always more expensive when it doesn't work.

[McBAIN Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close McBAIN]

that was my thoughts but I'm stuck in Gympie and there's nothing open on a sunday!

no fault codes registering... nothing abnormal when i started it up this morning to have a look & listen.

got RACQ on their way out to have a looksee.

[IRON-PAWW Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close IRON-PAWW]

Hmmmm. It's really difficult to say McBain.

The only similar thing I can think of is when we had to repair (rebuild) a large diesel on an agricultural harvester. Not that similar to a Prado.... I'm right there with you on that, however..... We got the rebuilt engine back and found in the fist 10 minutes of startup up the engine seemed to periodically come under heavy load for a few seconds and produce mountains of black smoke. Impossible to say, but it seemed like the pistons and rings might have been grabbing at the cylinders, worrying to say the least. I notice modern diesels don't seem to make as much black smoke under load, perhaps because of the better quality fuel now and technology advances in diesel engines. Diesels of old though used to make a bit of black sooty exhaust when they came under load, in my experience anyhow.

With the loss of power I'm thinking either some type of fuel issue, maybe causing the engine to run rough for small periods, perhaps being the tik tak noise you describe. Or something more nasty with the engine mechanics. I'm certainly no expert though......

[McBAIN Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close McBAIN]

RACQ guy didn't have much luck. Hard for him when it's not reproducable.

Suggested it could have been a sticky injector, stayed open for a fraction of a second and the extra fuel caused the smoke cloud.

The mistery remains..........

[damonat Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close damonat]

a couple of things to think about.
has it done anything like it before.
no.
are all the levels ok.
yes.
did you just fuel up before the trip.
yes. maybe bad fuel (this could still be bad news)
no. maybe a sensor on this way out.
toyota diesels if serviced well, live lloonngg after 170kms,
so it's a hard 1, and only you can make the call.
i hope for your sake it maybe just a sensor and it wont cause long term
issues, and you are able to drive it safely in the meantime.
definately keep us up to date

[McBAIN Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close McBAIN]

Thought fuel but first tank has been fine.

Thought tank changover as i'm almost through the first one, but if one feeds the other it can't be that.

Thought water in fuel but checked the filter and nothing there.

Thought sensor but no faults registered.

Plenty of oil.

No idea! But we see what mr Toyota says tomorrow!

It is due for a service anyway.

[Hutch Addicted PP Member Find all posts View Profile Close Hutch]

Good Luck mate, let us know how you go.

[sacred cow Member Find all posts View Profile Close sacred cow]

I had a similar problem with a petrol injected vehicle. It used to play up only for a second or two every hour. Then my wife was at a set of traffic lights and the car started running like a hairy goat and she saw heaps of black smoke everywhere. It turned out to be an injector stuck open. The only solution was to replace it.

First of all I would suggest you get your injectors cleaned and the spray pattern checked.

Regards
Glenn

[McBAIN Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close McBAIN]

thanks Glenn, I'm leaning that way too (though my knowledge of engines is up there with quantum physics) but i couldn't afford to be up in Gympie for the week so we loaded up, threw in a good serve of diesel injector cleaner and prepared to run the gauntlet (got all the gladiator phrases happening at the moment). Made it home with no probs, ran as it always has, if not better.

still heading down to toyota tomorrow though.

other thought was that it could be the cruise control playing up. but that doesn't explain the noise...

[Chippy Addicted PP Member Find all posts View Profile Close Chippy]

You may have been lucky enough to sort it out yourself.

I've had similar dramas with the old petrol Commodores when they gunked up an injector ... so I used to run a bottle of injector cleaner through them every month or two.

With any luck you had a lump of gunk sticking an injector .... and a decent drive pushing some injector cleaner through them may have cleaned it out. Still worth getting it checked out though

Hope it turns out to be wading in the cheap end of the solution pool :lol: :lol:

Cheers
Chippy

[MattWhite Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close MattWhite]

The 170k is the distance you did today isn't it? How many kays has the car done? I'm not a diesel specialist or anything but the place that does our injectors and pumps (Fremantle Fuel Injection) told us injectors are a servicable item (true) and should be serviced every 150k. I know we've had plenty done and you don't really notice how bad they were until you drive the same car afterwards. Anyway, I truly hope it isn't serious but if who ever looks at it says try servicing injectors, look at it as something that needs doing time to time anyway. Also, make sure it truly is a reputable shop. My 2c and goodluck.

Matt

[McBAIN Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close McBAIN]

got 113000 on the clock. i've had it for 60k of them.

[damonat Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close damonat]

gee you have less than i do. (i've got 137)
i'm surprised that you've had a drama.
really surprised.
you could be lucky and it was just a sticky or leaking injector. hope so.
let us know, cos if it is something, maybe i need to check mine out