diesel rattle in D4D Prado

[timbo_gxl_d4d Lurker Find all posts View Profile Close timbo_gxl_d4d]

Now for a tale of woe from a long time reader, first time poster. This is a long post, so bear with me...

We picked up our D4D manual back in early August 2008. It was fantastic - new car smell, diesel engine that just seemed to have infinite tourque, luxury interior (compared to a '91 Hilux!). Dream car.

Except for the nasty rattle when cold. It sounded like a monkey with a jack-hammer was trying to escape. It went away as the engine warmed up but it sounded like you would break something if you gave it any boot when it was cold. And it was pretty much there from day one.

Mon 8th September
Took it into the dealer for the 1000km tighten everything up that's come loose service. Told them about the rattle. They said the usual 'leave it over night with us and we'll let you know'

Thu 11th September
Left it over night and Friday they rang to say that would need injector number 4 replaced. Not a worry.

Wed 17th September
The injector had arrived on Tuesday so I dropped the car off. Work is reasonably close to the dealer so the courtesy bus dropped me off and picked me up. When I got back to the dealer in the afternoon they were still working on the car so I had to sit around for about an hour. They took it for the test drive and rolled it out for me to take home. Beauty! I headed off and literally got around the corner when
1. The rattle came back with a vengeance
2. The revs headed towards red-line all by themselves
3. A huge cloud of smoke erupted from the back of the car.
I was able to switch off and pull over before it hit red-line. I ran back to the dealer (This was about 5.58pm and they close at 6pm). The foreman came for a walk back to the car. Poked his head around under the bonnet for a bit, couldn't see anything wrong so he tried to start it. It cranked over once and then seized. He tried again and nothing, the starter motor was trying to turn against a seized engine.
His theory at the time was one of the cylinders was flooded with fuel and that was preventing the engine from turning over. You could actually hear the diesel escaping past the piston rings and into the sump, there's nowhere else for it to go!
They gave me a loan car (Avalon) and sent me on my way whilst they towed the Prado back to the dealer with a Cruiser.

Thu 18th September
Got a call from the dealer that the car was all good. Turns out that a seal around the injector had given way and let the diesel into the engine. Apparently Toyota said that the seal didn't need to be replaced because the engine was so new. On the ye olde '91 Hilux every time you pull an injector out you have to replace the seal because it a one-time-crush seal. I started the car and the starter motor made a dreadful racket as it was spinning down. Tried a few more times and each time it made the sound. Out comes the foreman again to look at the car and he confirms that auxiliary drive on the starter must have been strained when the motor was seized.. So the hang on to the Prado and leave me with the Avalon

(Weekend passes)

Tue 22nd September
Call from the dealer and the car is ready to go. First things first, try the starter motor a couple of times. Seems good. I picked the car up in the morning and it was a lot quieter than it was before the injector replacement. "Goody" I'm thinking.

I spent the rest of the week driving it around and decided that the rattle was still there and it was now quite pronounced when warm. So...

Tue 30th September
Drop the Prado off with the dealer again. They poke it and then decided they want to keep it over night.

Wed 1st October
I have the car back but they are doing a warranty claim now on injector number 3 this time. The process is they get the data, send it off to Toyota. Toyota looks at the data, decides on the warranty claim and sends out a new injector if the injector is out of tolerance.

Toyota claim that there is something wrong with the Winter Diesel fuel that is sold through to this time of the year and that causes the rattle. The word from the mechanics at the dealer is they are starting to replace more and more injectors on the D4D but "officially" the engine is fine.

That's the story to date. We are now waiting on the 2nd replacement injector and the car has only done 2064km. What a saga.

Cheers,
Tim

PS. The Avalon is not a good Prado replacement

[MDS69 Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close MDS69]

I purchase diesel based on price and convenience. Sometimes the majors, sometimes independants. For the life of me I cant imagine having to drive around trying to find "good quality"fuel to put in the truck. The damned thing is a 4x4, designed to be used in all sorts of harsh environments... not pussy footing around looking for fuel with 90kilo octaves devoid of bio whatchamecallit and taken from sterilised medical grade servo tanks. Equally, I am not going to continue to start up a 2007 model car in the shed and let it idle for 5 minuted before i use it.... Its not a 1917 model.....I dont have time for that rubbish....Mine is still ratting its *%*$*^off, and after its 40K service... it now seems to be slurping whatever fuel i give it, at an average of 17.5 lhk around town totally unladen after its longterm average of 12.5. Something is wrong and i am now about to hop on the bandwagon with Toyota BIGTIME. The dealer I purchased my car from has no idea, incompetent service personnel, and i am frankly pi_ _ed right off!
Prado aint my favourite truck right now!

Somewhere in the previous page or 3 someone asked if the D4D in other Toyotas ie Hilux had the same issue. A guy at work has a SR D4D 4WD with approx 12000km and it rattles. He bought it new as well. The rattle only started recently. His fuel consumption has increased hence my quoting the post above but he recently fitted an ARB winch bar so isn't sure if it is the rattle or the bar tha has caused the increase consumption.

Just a quick update. Mates Hilux is going in for replacement of injector #3 & #4

[RUSTY Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close RUSTY]

Oh Tim sorry to hear the bad news :cry: it can only get better from now on. Iam at the same stage waiting to hear from toyota about my data readings , after my dealer did over night cold start test. Of corse they said it was all fine but i think we know better :x Best of luck with your pride and joy. Russell

[intens Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close intens]

ohh no... mines starting to get noisy with only 2000kms :cry:

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

Hi Tim,
A sad tale, strewth that Toyota dealer needs some trained mechanics, and now fuel injector number three needs replacing, I hope they sort it out for you.

[babs Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close babs]

new injector time

Hello everyone,

Toyota called last week and have confirmed that they are replacing all my injectors sometime in the next two weeks, just waiting on parts to arrive.

They are not going to do the cold start testing and reflash ( temp fix ) but replace the lot and then the reflash.

I will keep you all informed on the progress of this adventure.


cheers,

Babs

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

Re: new injector time

Hello everyone,

Toyota called last week and have confirmed that they are replacing all my injectors sometime in the next two weeks, just waiting on parts to arrive.

They are not going to do the cold start testing and reflash ( temp fix ) but replace the lot and then the reflash.

I will keep you all informed on the progress of this adventure.


cheers,

Babs

This sounds like the dealership talking and not Toyota Corporate. Don't be surprised if they end up doing the testing and then only replace the faulty injector.

I was originally told the same thing by the service department but then reality bit and T.C. only authorised the replacement of the one faulty injector.

[Ba77hy Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Ba77hy]

Toyota replaced one of my injectors, Number 3 injector was running a low pressure!, After it was replaced have not heard the rattle again!!!!

However this problem seems quite common and I am sure that it will pop up again shortly!

When it does I will be taking it back to toyota again and getting them to fix!!

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

Mine went in again last week... They acknowledge a fault but they're not sure how to deal with the data logged.

The data was to be sent off to Toyota to see what the fault is and how to fix it.

Cheers,

Crammy

[gxl_d4d Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close gxl_d4d]

Does anyone have any more details on what the ECU reflash is supposed to do?

I've got my car going to the dealer today for a ticking noise and idle and under certain load conditions as well as an occasional misfire at idle.

I'm a bit concerned that if the dealer re-flashes the ecu I'll be down on power or torque.

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

Ok I got a call from the dealer this arvo and No.2 injector to be replaced next monday.

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

At least Toyota is replacing items and looking to fix - albeit on a case by case basis. Possibly a bad batch of injectors randomly distributed. Hopefully the replacements will solve everyone's problems.

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

Had number 4 injector replaced and its back to normal so crossing my fingers that will be the only one replaced.

[RUSTY Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close RUSTY]

Hi Rattlers, Got a call from my dealer today, after sending my data to toyota they asked me to bring it back in about 3 weeks, once the big knobs given them the go ahead.They all got together on the weekend and desiged that this problem is not going away. So now iam getting the reflash ; then 1000km of driving ; then check all the injectors & replace any that are faulty.I think this is the stage most of us are at. I was told that the ECU is the problem it is not sensing the cold start there for pumping to much diesel into the chamber which causes the pinging or rattle we hear, this is dirtying the injectors. The idea behind the 1000km of driving is to clean them? This is what i was told today . My rattle is only there at a cold start not at normal operating temp unlike some you, so hopefully the refash will do the trick.They also said they are only getting in touch with the people who have complained so i dout if there is going to be a recall on all d4ds. I will keep you all posted, Russell.

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

Hi Rattlers, Got a call from my dealer today, after sending my data to toyota they asked me to bring it back in about 3 weeks, once the big knobs given them the go ahead.They all got together on the weekend and desiged that this problem is not going away. So now iam getting the reflash ; then 1000km of driving ; then check all the injectors & replace any that are faulty.I think this is the stage most of us are at. I was told that the ECU is the problem it is not sensing the cold start there for pumping to much diesel into the chamber which causes the pinging or rattle we hear, this is dirtying the injectors. The idea behind the 1000km of driving is to clean them? This is what i was told today . My rattle is only there at a cold start not at normal operating temp unlike some you, so hopefully the refash will do the trick.They also said they are only getting in touch with the people who have complained so i dout if there is going to be a recall on all d4ds. I will keep you all posted, Russell.

Interesting info there Rusty. When I spoke to my dealer they said they had sent the data off to toyota and not a week later they said they will replace No.2 injector and "we'll see how that goes" to fix the problem. There was no mention of a reflash in my case. My rattle got progressively worse to a point where now I can hear it when up to temp. Maybe there are a few different issues at play here. 1 - Being a programming issue and 2 - an injector issue or 3 - maybe both?

With the weather warming up here in Cairns (Cold start a balmy 24-25 degrees this morning) I have noticed it's not as pronounced on cold start but is still there none the less. But when up to temp it is louder than ever.

Cheers,

Crammy