We were not headed in the right direction, you were taking us back to the stone age...

I don't remember what my ST and LT fuel trims were but that's just the computer compensating based on the 02 anyway. You're really not going to draw any conclusive info from that.

What we have concluded from this thread so far:

It's real detonation as verified with a scanner and the fact that it goes away with octane.

It gets worse as outside temps rise.

AF is fine. I verified this on the dyno just driving around and at WOT.

It happens mostly at part throttle in a certain rpm range for the majority of owners.

If anyone sees anything I missed, let me know.

 

I totally agree with you on that point. But what I was defending was the fact that you stated that catastophic failure was a definite thing. You need to understand my side...when some Aziner reads that this alledged pinging may blow holes in their pistons they show up where I work, claiming there car is pinging and if I dont fix it then they will end up with a hole in their piston!! Believe me you have no idea what I go thru everyday. Clashing flame fronts are not good, we know this. What I was TRY Then I have this jerkoff junctionfet popping off about everything from engine theory to grammar its like why bother?? What i was TYRING to do was gather some info so I could look at some data on My own car (that doesnt ping) and see if I could figure out what the deal was. Essentially trying to help. Then all the stones came flying at me. Its not this thread either. Acurazine has changed a lot in the past few years. Seriously.

 

Would absolutely determine something from that. Newer Acs rely and make adjustments based on A/F values. O2 sensors are used pretty much for nothing more than cat efficiency thresholds. Most of our cars have since done away with o2s period. Thing that puzzles me is that if the car is pinging, I would expect to fluctutations in the A/F values and this would directly influence the fuel trims since they are related. I would also be curious to see the EGR lift value during the ping.

 

Question to folks who have worked at a dealership: can anyone confirm that they have NEVER had to replace a motor that had died prematurely to knocking?

I don't know enough about engines to be able to reasonably comment on RACINGHART03's contention that while pinging is annoying, it is not going to cause our engines to die after the warranty has expired.

 

02s are absolutely still used. If they weren't, the LT and ST trim wouldn't exist. The computer calculates how much fuel is needed but things change over time and the 02 has to be there to correct if need be. Heck, the TL has to be in closed loop operation (reading the 02, cats fired off) within 10 seconds of startup. That's pretty amazing.

I'm sure it's not an A/F problem. I drove my car on the dyno like I would drive in traffic for a few minutes to see what the AF was like. My point of going to the dyno was to diagnose or at least eliminate one of the causes of pinging. Everything looked great as far as the AF.

I may go back and watch the EGR function more closely on the scanner. But with mine, it showed tons of knock retard at WOT too so it's not just the EGR.

There's always the possiblility that the management if fine and all of the cams were ground with too much advance. On that point it would be interesting to see how many people only hear the pinging before vtec kicks in.

I wonder if we can hit Acura from an emissions standpoint. Detonation causes NOx emissions to skyrocket. Since they're not interested in fixing this problem for their customers, maybe they need to be forced to do it.

 

Here's another point that doesnt' seem to get brought up much...

Detonation by itself causes a loss in power and gas mileage. When coupled with the resulting timing retard there's a signifigant reduction in mileage and power.

I have personally blown headgaskets and broken ring lands from detonation in my other car.

 

Hold on a sec. Just to clarify. There are no 02 sensors on a 2004 and up Acura TL. There are primary and secondary Air Flow sensors B1 and B2 which are totally different than O2 sensors. What is the Af you were talking about? I am lost. I was also under the impression that the guys were getting this under light accel. The first I heard of it under WOT was yours. Also I have never replaced any Acura engines/components or heard of having to replace engines/components due to pinging. Now dont ask me how many engine components I had to replace working and the race shop due to spark knock. I am sure Mr GM GN guy can tell you all about that. if yours is doing it under WOT than that makes a difference. What is the consensus. I scrolled thru the threads and it sounded like it was a light accel issue.

 

There are primary wideband 02s before the cats for engine management and secondary 02s after the cats to measure catalytic convertor efficiency.

Short and long term fuel trim are adjustments based on 02 sensor input period. Without 02s you would not have ST and LT trim.

Mine does it pretty much everywhere starting from about 30% throttle and up.

I can't hear it at WOT over the noise of everything else but on the scanner it shows up as up to 28 degrees of retard. Most here hear it at part throttle but most have not put it on a scanner either. If I had not put mine on a scanner I would also think it only knocks only at part throttle.

 

Ok. So we are on the same page. Have you pulled your egr valve off and taken a look for any excessive carbon buildup? I know we had an issue with the RL where the fuel injector spray pattern was causing carbon buildup in the egr system (and I am sure otherplaces as well), I have never really payed any attention to the knock retard on our cars but the next time I am out I will take a few snapshots and see if anything looks fishy. I wonder if the carbon is keeping the EGR open a little and that extra bit of air is just enuff to set off the ping. oh and while I am thinking of it. Egr lift values please. (Also at idle) That will be the tell tale. We have been plagued by EGR issues since the Honda came out with the V6.

 

Shouldn't be any EGR at idle. Too much EGR would be better than too little as far as pinging is concerned. I'm pulling mine off today to see what I find. My car would be a better candidate for plugged EGR since it started around 40K miles. But some people have had this problem in the first 1,000 miles which is far too soon to plug anything up.

 

Yeah thats why I asked. I want to know what yours is reading as opposed to a known good vehicle (value wise). Yours is not a Type S right?

 

Yeah, just a base 06. I'll have access to the scanner tomorrow after work and I'll let you know. I don't remember numbers from the previous scans but I do remember that EGR was functioning or at least the computer was commanding it.

The problem is I know it's not just EGR because of how bad it pings at WOT. For my driving style I would be happy if the EGR fixed the part throttle detonation because I only floor it maybe once a month.

Waiting for it to cool off a little before I go outside to pull the EGR.

 

Well let me know what you find. Ill get some readings when I go back to work and we can compare. I have done a shitload of injectors on your model TL for lean issues but usually I had fuel trim issues. I am in the dark. I have a friend with an 07 S and in the meantime I will ask him if he has noticed anything.

 

Update...

I removed the EGR valve today. Just a very light coat of carbon, nothing that would cause obstructions. I even fired the motor with the valve off and just as it should, it sounded like a huge exhaust leak, rpms shot up to 3,000, and I could hear the massive vacuum leak. Nothing is plugged up in the EGR system. Check that one off the list.

 

Like you said, these cars are doin this at like 1500 miles so I kinda was leaning away from that already but hey you never know. You said your car has only 40k on it right?

 

Just hit 63,000. It started the pinging at 30-40K. Always surged and I could hear an occasional ping but it didn't get bad until then. 95% of the miles are freeway at a 65mph cruise for 4 hours at a time so I was a prime candidate for a plugged EGR.

When timing belt replacement time comes I'm going to check cam timing before I pull the belt and see if it's possibly retarded and causing too high of cylinder pressures.

Tomorrow I'm going to look at fuel trims and see if the computer is adding fuel signaling I may have a lean injector but I would've caught that last time I scanned it. With the xylene in the tank, I can't realistically check knock because I'm running roughly 97 octane.

Maybe a compression check next time I do plugs. In fact if the cam timing is off, it would show up in cranking compression...

 

Yeah that is a good place to start. In my findings you can see the injector issue at idle. Monitor the fuel trims at idle after about a minute or two and then just let the car sit and look about 10 minutes later. They should be the same. On all of the Tls I have had to replace injectors on the fuel trims s l o w l y creep higher and higher.

 

Hey something else just dawned on me. Its a total pain in the ass without the right shit but I have had a bunch of fuel pressure regulators go to hell as well. I am looking at your car in particular since you diagnosed it as true spark knock. The OP on this one thought he was hearing valve noise. If this is a newer thing with your car then I doubt is was a factory design flaw like programmed timing. My guess is that your cause is a somewhat lean condition due to A> Fuel supply problem, or B> With the prices of gas being totally out of control and so much doping at the gas station I wonder if your premium is really premium at all? Compression spec for your motor is 135PSI so that would be something you could easily check but man I am telling you. New injectors we use SUCK. They cost like 20 bucks each. I kid you not.

 

The fuel doping has crossed my mind, believe me. In my GN I used to be able to run 16psi boost on 91 octane. Practically overnight I could only run 12psi before I encountered knock. This car is always on a data logger and I keep very, very close tabs on everything since I'm on the stock bottom end and any detonation will make it go boom real quick. If anything is even a little off I know about it immediately. I had to pull timing back from 24 degrees to 18 degrees and turn the methanol up to be able to run a decent boost level. I wish there were a way to check the actual octane rating. My car acts exactly like the one time my mom borrowed it and put 87 in it when it was new.

Do you know the flow rating on the stock injectors? I'm not worried about the fuel pump because it runs ok at WOT but regulator or injectors.... I'll know as soon as I look at the fuel trim.

 

Yeah I have no issues with a volume problem with the pumps except one that didnt work at all. That was last week acutally. Let me see if I can get that info tomorrow when I go back to work. Lemme know if you find anything with the fuel trims creeping up. Thats a pretty open and closed case right there. We had the regulator TSB on the 04 tls but that doesnt cover yours. Lets see what happens with the fuel trims and go from there. Also when was the last time your car was at the dealer? I am sure there are ECU updates for your model. Kinda interesting you lost 4PSI in regards to your knock on the GN. I really wonder if these f ers at the station are playing games. Did that change coincide at all with your pinging on the Tl?

 

The knock in the GN happened in the winter so it's hard to say but the following summer was when I first had the problem with the TL. The TL barely knocks in the winter so it's definately possible they made a small change to the gasoline formulations. FWIW, I've tuned the GN for 87 octane in the past with the laptop just to see what I was able to get away with just in case 91 wasn't available and 10psi was about the limit without knock so assuming it's the gas, this 91 premium looks more like 89.

What type of updates are available for the 06s? Mine is past warranty by 13K.

 

I dont know the specific details of each CMU update. They dont tell us. Now one of the first steps in troubleshooting is make sure the ECU has the most current software. Most of the cars dont. They tweak things here and there. But maybe a newer flash would help you out.

 

I know you can't give specific prices but do you have a round about estimate of what they would charge?

 

1 hour at whatever their rate is. Just check out those fuel trims first.

 

Hey Racing, can you please elaborate on the regulator TSB? Also, do you know when the last update to the ECU flash was? Mine was flashed last October to the most current one (at that time) and if another one has come out since then.

I have a 2004 TL that is exhibiting the ping/knock issue (and was verified by Acura techs). It only has 20K miles on it and has been doing this since around 10K miles a year and and a half ago.

 

It was only a start up issue for the most part but who knows. You would have to ask them what flash they programmed. Woulld have an ID number.

 

I put $20 worth of Lukoil Premium last week and the pinging stopped. I filled-up this week (at same station location) and so far so good. This station was about $0.30 per gallon more than everywhere else. I'm starting to think that stations and/or refineries are cheating us and our engines are just more sensitive to low octane than other cars. In other words, other engines might run poorly but not ping on regular gas but ours will ping.

If this assumption about getting cheated are untrue, then why is my car not pinging on Lukoil, at least from this one station? Also, if you do the xylene math, one gallon of xylene to 5 gallons of 87(regular) = 92 octane which would explain why we're not pinging when using xylene. We think we're bringing the octane up to 97 (from 93) but really we're just going from 87 to 92 which is about where Acura recommends the octane to be.

It's starting to look to me like we're buying premium and getting regular. Most cars and/or customers won't notice the difference so it's a very easy cheat to pull-off. I know there are fines for selling lower octane than posted but with the cost of gas right now and the potential profit from this, it might be worth the gamble. Does anyone know what the fines amount to if a station dopes their gas?

 

I think you have a valid point. It's been in the back of my mind for some time too.

I know it happens because like I said earlier, I kept very close tabs on the GN, I never went WOT without data logging it. I knew what I could run on 87,89, and 91. Even back in the old days I would sometimes fill up on 91 and get a ton of knock for no reason and fill up again and it would be gone. Cut and dry clear as day what happened. I'm starting to think that today it's more common. Now I have to run it on 100 octane if my methanol injection isn't working. I literally have to run the old "87" boost levels on 91 now.

Even if a big company like Honda knew what was going on, they probably wouldn't open their mouth against big oil.

 

I was told by a colleague that 350 NJ gas stations were caught in violation last week. Now I'm starting to understand. Here's a link to the article ->

http://nightclubcity.com/forum/showthread.php?t=173339

I feel better now that I know it's probably the gas and not my car.....but it makes me want to get a car that is designed for regular gas so I don't have to worry about getting ripped-off on the octane.

 

As I had first mentioned a few pages back, my '08 TL-S slightly pings under load typically in 3rd gear when I'm hammering it. The pinging is faint, but it's there. I've noticed it on several occasions, always at WOT in 3rd and on warm days....*sigh*

Hopefully, it doesn't get worse....

 

I am leaning towards crappy gas too at this point. The equipment to test actuall octane is big bucks and testing is scarce.

 

But if the octane in the gas is the problem, then wouldn't all high-compression engines be pinging -- not just our TL's?

Has anyone heard of other car owners (BMW's, Lexus, etc.) complaining of pinging too? If this is not specific to our TLs, then I would concede that the oil companies are putting low-octane gas in their premium pumps.

Also, isn't the TL supposed to be able to run on lower octanes -- albeit with less performance -- without pinging anyway?

 

I noticed the strangest thing for the last couple days. I'll get in the car and it might ping like crazy and the trans shifts sloppy. The next time I drive it it might drive ok. What I started doing is if got into one of it's pinging fits, I pulled over, shut the engine off, and restarted. About half the time this cured it. If it didn't cure it the first time it eventually did after the second or third time I shut it off and restarted. It wasn't just a little difference but a lot. Once running right, it ran perfect until I shut it off again.

 

I'm just throwing this out there because I'm not sure if it's been mentioned yet in the 23+ pages of this thread, but could it possibly be the stock ECU reacting with the ethanol that's been added into gas now? Technically it shouldn't, but I've heard of other cars reacting strangely to the somewhat recent change in gas composition. A friend of mine had a Ridgeline that was basically shutting itself off until he took it into the dealer and they diagnosed it as reacting poorly to ethanol gas. I think they had a reflash set up for him and it ran fine afterwards. My brother's Lancer had the same issues and IIRC resulted in the same fix. Just throwing that out there, I don't know the science behind it but that could be a possibility.

It would also not surprise me at all if gas stations were swapping out good gas for the bad stuff to see some profit. Stations don't make money on gas really at all, they make it on their concessions.

 

I've noticed the same thing myself. My car will be pinging like crazy on the way to the dealership and after waiting to get a tech into the car, the car's pinging would disappear and I'd get the polite-but-are-you-hearing-sounds-in-your-head look from them (since the car was off while I was at inside the dealership). Going to make sure that next time, I leave it running (and locked!) while I wait.

IHCars: This pinging that you are getting: is it still with the xylene that you added to your tank to bring it up to 97 octane? I had thought that going to 97 octane had cleared your issue...?

 

Umm, sounds like a reflash of the ECU to adjust for the Ethanol additions might fix our problem. However, I've been having this problem for almost 2 years now on my 2004, so unless the reformulation of the gas has been taking place since 2006, the Ethanol might not be the cause of (at least, my) pinging issue.

 

I've been through 3 tanks since the last posting. Didn't have the time or money to put xylene in on the last one. It still runs fine on 97ish octane.

I wish I could get E85 around here. The turbo guys have found it gives about the same performance as 116 octane race gas for 1/5 the price.

 

The experience I have with my car (2007 type s) is that whenever they change Winter gas to a Summer, pinging disappears and is impossible to hear. I had my car for two summers and one winter. Both summers I can't hear pinging. Whenever they change to Winter gas it starts pinging and it does even when I am not driving. I was trying to pin point pinging sound with a long tube-pipe and it was coming form the engine place where it turns the timing belt, the main-bottom shaft. It seems it is coming from inside the engine. I brought my car to dealership in winter and they told it is probably form the salt and is going to be ok. The thing is that whatever they do with the Summer fuel, it helps with the pinging problem.

 

Wow so many acuras have so many problems. Glad to be getting an infiniti

 

Not really.

It's just that this where everybody comes to ask about or solve problems. Add to that most people here are *really* picky about every little thing.

Go to Lexus, Inifinti, BMW, MB, etc forums and look around - they have "lots" of problems too.