Lumpy running 1.33L when maintaining a constant lower speed.

[Mooly]

1 hour ago, TonyHSD said:

The fuel might be the culprit. Here I have my plugs changed last year at 60k miles interval.

It does make you wonder. 

I took those pictures in full sun outside and tbh they don't look rusty, I think its more an anomaly or artefact of the light tbh.

1 hour ago, TonyHSD said:

These has 17Nm by the book, although I always been doing them at at 25Nm by the old standard. 

 

1 hour ago, flash22 said:

The plugs have crush washers, if you don't crush them you can lose some compression and suck in air, leaning the mix out

oem spec for the plugs is 20 Nm or 15 ftLb

 I obviously had them way under torqued for the no start situation to occur although I followed the tightening instructions as I thought correct. Finger tight and then I added a 1/3 of a turn. I was way out. The torque wrench would have been around 25Nm or a shade less. The calibration stops at 28Nm but you can keep winding out a bit more and count the markers on the rotating part although I don't want to unwind it to far that the rotating part comes off etc.

[TonyHSD]

16 hours ago, Mooly said:

It does make you wonder. 

I took those pictures in full sun outside and tbh they don't look rusty, I think its more an anomaly or artefact of the light tbh.

 

 I obviously had them way under torqued for the no start situation to occur although I followed the tightening instructions as I thought correct. Finger tight and then I added a 1/3 of a turn. I was way out. The torque wrench would have been around 25Nm or a shade less. The calibration stops at 28Nm but you can keep winding out a bit more and count the markers on the rotating part although I don't want to unwind it to far that the rotating part comes off etc.

I think this torque wrench it’s a bit too large for this job and this might be the reason for not tightening them right the first time.
What I know from older mechanics is that if you use the right size tools you might be ok to set correct torque settings even without a torque wrench. 20-25Nm it will be ok. More or less might cause some issues.
 Most important here is to prevent damage to the threads as this will cause real problems.
What I do usually after I place the plug into the socket and position into the whole I spin it anti-clockwise half turn and then hand tight until the plug stop rotating and then use the torque wrench. Sometimes they rotate more difficult and I use the same ratchet that I used to undo them and once they stop I continue with the torque wrench. 

[Mooly]

1 hour ago, TonyHSD said:

I think this torque wrench it’s a bit too large for this job and this might be the reason for not tightening them right the first time.

When I tightened them first time I didn't use the wrench at all simply because the packaging says to angle tighten. I did them as tight as I could by hand with the long reach plug spanner. So obviously not very tight just by holding this by hand, and then I did the angle turn:

When that didn't work I used the torque wrench. 28 Nm is lowest calibrated mark but it will go a little lower if you are careful. Going off how much more they turned with the wrench I would say I was another half turn off where they should be.

The problem with the angle method is knowing how tight they have to be to begin with before adding the required 1/4 to 1/2 turn.  

[Gerg]

Those knackered plugs are worse than any I've ever seen that have come out of a 'still running' engine.

Just some random thoughts here, and excuse the usual lengthy post from me:

We have a 2001 1.4 vvti Corolla with 135,000 miles, owned from new.  Oil consumption is around 1L per 1200 miles.

On that car, on a light throttle opening at a steady 40-50 mph in 5th, I can just sometimes detect some pinking.  This is with the radio off, naturally, you have to strain to hear it. 

If you lift or press the throttle a really tiny amount, it is no longer audible.  On that engine it seems to be 'on the edge' in those conditions (your original hesitancy conditions?), that's how the ignition advance curve is mapped, I guess, probably for fuel economy. I can't hear pinking under any other conditions.

I wonder if your (now fixed) hesitancy was exacerbated by the engine knock sensor trying to adjust the ignition timing to stop some pinking, or in your case, perhaps, detonation?  This is just a wild guess.

The build up of carbon on the plugs is surely indicating a build up in the combustion chamber overall.  With such potential hot spots and raised compression, I wonder if this is a major contributer to your horrendous plug damage, through detonation?

There is a technical department (in Coventry, fwiw) for Denso plugs, I have spoken to a chap there, Mike Sadler, he's very friendly and happy to advise. Tel. 02476 842500, if that's any use.

Our 1.4 had it's plugs changed at 115,000 miles, by myself, the old NGK plugs (not Iridium in this one) were in general good shape.  The engine oil consumption has been bad since around 75,000 miles, despite me doubling-up the oil changes to six monthly from new.

The Iridium on your plugs is a very fine wafer on the opposing surfaces of the electrodes, at least that's what I understand.  Your plugs probably don't have any left at all!

I have tried, for three oil changes, starting about 5 years back, adding Wynns engine flush through this motor. (Pour into old oil, leave to tickover for 20 mins, drain and refill with clean oil and new filter). It didn't fix the oil consumption problems, but it did reduce consumption by about 30 - 40%.  I haven't used it for a while now.  The oil consumption has subsequently returned to what it was before.  The car is more rattly just after a flush, but settles right down after a few journeys.

This car has always been run on 5w/30 oil.

There are owners of higher mileage petrol cars (not necessarily Toyota, I cant remember which forum I have seen this on, VW?!), who are adamant that the 'super' petrols have improved significantly their oil consumption problems.  I rang Shell technical (getting through to any fuel company technical dept. was very hard work, btw), they say that their 'super' fuels will not clean pistons down to that depth (i.e. around the rings). Who to believe, eh?

If you wanted to acheive a very low torque setting, or help confirm the accuracy of your current wrench, you could always experiment with a set of portable baggage scales (cheap - starting at £2.19 in Savers chemists, Home Bargains do one too) attached to your wrench at a known, measured distance from the pivot point.

All open to discussion, of course.

HTH.

 

 

 

[Gerg]

I guess I should have added:

Mooly's engine oil consumption is down to the low-friction piston rings wearing out prematurely, not so?

Our Corolla is the victim of gummed-up oil scraper rings and the piston oil-return holes (behind the oil scraper) becoming blocked, at least as I understand it.

So the Wynns flush may not give the same results on the 1.33 engine as our older 1.4.

[TonyHSD]

Thanks Gerg for sharing your thoughts and experience. Very interesting and informative reading. One thing I noticed you mentioned half intervals oil changes and yes your experience confirms my thoughts that even if we change oil every 2000 miles this will not help or stop oil consumption  wherever time comes to it. Even the car care nut showed many time examples of Toyota cars that has had oil change every 5k miles from new in Toyota dealers only and still these cars started to burn oil after some miles been done. Same with my car too. Not a drop of oil been used between changes up to around 100k miles, then started to consume gradually, higher oil consumption in winter as I keep the car stationary with engine ON for long times. Before the introduction of e10 I was using e5 95 and often and particularly when cheap petrol been filled in the car was badly knocking on cold starts. Since new petrol standards I use mostly e5 99 premium fuel from Tesco and I almost have no knocking problems on cold starts. , plus the much smoother and quieter engine run. 

[Mooly]

4 hours ago, TonyHSD said:

Thanks Gerg for sharing your thoughts and experience.

+1 to that. Thanks Gerg. That's a really interesting read.

6 hours ago, Gerg said:

Those knackered plugs are worse than any I've ever seen that have come out of a 'still running' engine.

They sure looked bad to my untrained eye. 'Still running' LOL, yes it was and for the most part running well, particularly on motorway and fast A roads. Good acceleration, good mpg. It was just the low speed running when hot that made me aware.

6 hours ago, Gerg said:

We have a 2001 1.4 vvti Corolla with 135,000 miles, owned from new.  Oil consumption is around 1L per 1200 miles.

Got one of those sat on the drive, it was my dads. Mileage is only a third of yours. Zero oil consumption, pulls like a train...

 

6 hours ago, Gerg said:

I wonder if your (now fixed) hesitancy was exacerbated by the engine knock sensor trying to adjust the ignition timing to stop some pinking, or in your case, perhaps, detonation?  This is just a wild guess.

You could be on the money with that. It went through a spell last year of very noticeable pinking, particularly coming off a motorway, you slow down for the exit roundabout, all clear, foot down in third if going fast enough at it was very noticeable. You could then suddenly feel what I assume would be the timing being reigned back as it suddenly lost a bit of urge.

6 hours ago, Gerg said:

The build up of carbon on the plugs is surely indicating a build up in the combustion chamber overall.  With such potential hot spots and raised compression, I wonder if this is a major contributer to your horrendous plug damage, through detonation?

I've seen something about that gets a mention in that 1NRFE bulletin of the common issues. Another symptom is apparently hard starting although I've never suffered that. Always instant firing, even with those grotty plugs in.

I've long suspected that the consumption is worse when keeping in gear when slowing down and better on long steady speed runs. The last week and I've been slipping into neutral rather than using engine braking... I'll let you know how it goes in that. Fwiw I dipped the oil this morning and it was about 2mm down from full and I'm pretty sure I've done around 300 miles since topping up last. Also haven't seen any smoke at all (using engine braking and then stepping on the gas is what caused a wipe out of smoke every time).

6 hours ago, Gerg said:

If you wanted to acheive a very low torque setting, or help confirm the accuracy of your current wrench, you could always experiment with a set of portable baggage scales (cheap - starting at £2.19 in Savers chemists, Home Bargains do one too) attached to your wrench at a known, measured distance from the pivot point.

Thanks 🙂 I remember my dad once fitting a head gasket to a Seagull outboard motor and it officially needed to be torqued although I think those things were designed to be fixed by whatever was available in the field tbh.

Anyhow I remember him calculating what weight he would need hung off a bar of whatever length it was to achieve that torque. So weighed out potatoes in a bucket hung off a bar did the job. Can't see Toyota approving of that though.  

 

[Gerg]

15 hours ago, Mooly said:

19 hours ago, TonyHSD said:

Thanks Gerg for sharing your thoughts and experience.

+1 to that. Thanks Gerg. That's a really interesting read.

Cheers!  Always good to think you've been of some use!

Now, this is where any hint of credibility I might have garnered goes right out the window...

So, I was thinking, removing the carbon in your combustion chamber? Maybe revisiting a few 'old' ideas might help in your case.  But the most interesting ones might be a bit too extreme.  I wouldn't suggest doing exactly what this bloke is doing, but, the basic technique does seem to work quite well!

Also:

https://www.youtube.com/c/ProjectFarm

I don't watch many YouTube videos at all, but this bloke!  Another slightly crazy American, this one with so many lawnmower engines that are clearly dispensible...

Lots of carbon removal tests in there.

Anyway, back on Planet Earth, I have these little electric motors in the garage, like you do:

These are a pair of peristaltic pumps, the type you see on kidney dialysis machines.  One is using a mains synchronous motor (as manufactured) to give a low volume delivery or suction.

The upper one I have fitted a 24 volt dc motor with its own reduction gearbox.  This now works comfortably in the range of around 5 - 24 volt, so variable speed delivery is a definite option here.  These were cobbled together from worn out parts from a previous job I was involved in. 

Don't worry, this was originally put together as a 'when-on-holiday' tomato watering system, but the idea was dropped through a complete lack of interest (wife).

Perhaps the upper motor could be put to use in an under-bonnet water feed system?  This, to try and remove built-up carbon deposits?

It would be seperately switched (near to the pump), but take regulated adjustable power from, say, the side light circuit, for convenience.

The delivery is going to be very slow if needed, as slow as one drop every 5 seconds IIRC, maybe less.

A pipe (windscreen washer tube or similar - I have loads) could run up the air intake through its open end.  This would be anchored into, and just passed beyond, an old (so worthless) air filter element.  Lots of hot-melt glue would be used to good effect in this part.  Nothing to vibrate and fall off into the engine, I hope!

The plan, if you can call it that, would be to wait until the car is warmed up, and about to go on a long, brisk run.  The sidelights would be turned on and the pump then slowly drips water, from a container, into the inlet manifold.  Near the end of that trip, the sidelights are turned off, to allow moisture residue to be worked through the manifold, and for it to dry off, prior to parking up.

I'm thinking the inlet air flow would help the water distribute into all cylinders fairly evenly (?), the finer the better.  I'd much rather the droplet was aerated, rather than clinging to the inlet manifold.

In various places in the garage I have all these bits, for what its worth.

Is this Heath-Robinson lash-up the answer to your longer term motoring contentment, Mooly?

What could go wrong ?!?!

Just an idea. 

All input welcome. 

[TonyHSD]

I had a go with “marvel mystery oil” and it did cleaned a bit on top of the pistons, however this can cause more damage to the cylinder walls. The carbon deposits are very hard material and any tiny peace that becomes dislodged and find it’s way between the pistons and cylinder walls can cause deeper scratches, lines and increases oil consumption even further plus reduces efficiency and performance. It is very tricky process. All you can safely do is to use engine flushes with each oil change, add petrol injector cleaners into the tank, use top quality fuels and lubricants. That’s pretty much all. Anything further it will require dismantle and parts replacement. In my problematic car I noted that using Shell Helix ultra engine oil helped reduce the oil consumption a bit and the oil remained cleaner for longest time in comparison to other oil brands. 

[Mooly]

3 hours ago, Gerg said:

Now, this is where any hint of credibility I might have garnered goes right out the window...

Nooo 🤣

I had a good watch of those videos in the link, pretty amazing stuff really.

 

3 hours ago, Gerg said:

Perhaps the upper motor could be put to use in an under-bonnet water feed system?  This, to try and remove built-up carbon deposits?

We're all waiting for you to report back on that after you've given it a whirl. Eeek.

(How about the rear washer pump water feed, water injection on demand)  

 

3 hours ago, Gerg said:

Is this Heath-Robinson lash-up the answer to your longer term motoring contentment, Mooly?

 Hehe. Probably fair to say it won't be happening any time soon on mine but if you had an old scrapper there could be hours of fun experimenting.

Thanks 🙂

 

[Mooly]

2 hours ago, TonyHSD said:

I had a go with “marvel mystery oil” and it did cleaned a bit on top of the pistons, however this can cause more damage to the cylinder walls.

Oooh, I often tend to see additives as kind of the 'last chance saloon' really. They often seem to promise much and fail to deliver in practice. I don't include quality fuels and oils and their own additive packages in that, more tipping additional stuff in to try and fix what is a genuine mechanical issue. I know there is a lot in between though and its a grey area 🙂

[TonyHSD]

22 minutes ago, Mooly said:

Oooh, I often tend to see additives as kind of the 'last chance saloon' really. They often seem to promise much and fail to deliver in practice. I don't include quality fuels and oils and their own additive packages in that, more tipping additional stuff in to try and fix what is a genuine mechanical issue. I know there is a lot in between though and its a grey area 🙂

There are additives and additives. Some calling them “ snake oil” and might be right. I personally found that wynns have some really good stuff that helped me various times and been recommending them here and other members came back to report positive results, some said nothing happened. Usually a general rule when using a quality additives is that if there are no difference or any affect then mean it was not needed at first place. I have good results with catalytic converter and lambda sensor cleaner made by wynns. The car had some bad pulsating under hard acceleration, added this thing to 30ltr of petrol and took the cars for a good motorway run of 40 min at high speed and no issues ever since. The problem returned when I stopped driving as much and I was keeping the car in ready mode with engine on and off during lockdown, then I used again this additive and again fixed my issues. Now only using e5 99 , no pulsating, no noises, no knocking on cold start and the plugs look in good shape. Been using their other stuff too, like engine stop leak, didn’t stop the leak though. 👍

[Mooly]

I suppose 🙂

Interesting you mention E5 as being more of a permanent fix in your case. I guess like most things, you have to base your own views on your own experiences. I think I'll probably stick with E5 now.

2 hours ago, TonyHSD said:

didn’t stop the leak though.

Many many years ago on an Audi A4 I tried a special sealant (that forms a flexible polymer on contact with air) that was marketed as a miracle fix for leaks on air con systems. The Audi had a leak on the evaporator.

I found the same as you. Didn't stop the leak though...

[TonyHSD]

39 minutes ago, Mooly said:

I suppose 🙂

Interesting you mention E5 as being more of a permanent fix in your case. I guess like most things, you have to base your own views on your own experiences. I think I'll probably stick with E5 now.

Many many years ago on an Audi A4 I tried a special sealant (that forms a flexible polymer on contact with air) that was marketed as a miracle fix for leaks on air con systems. The Audi had a leak on the evaporator.

I found the same as you. Didn't stop the leak though...

The wynns helped about the pulsating issue definitely. I was using e5 but 95 the old standard  but then since a switched to e5 99 no issues at all.
Soon if the weather allows me I will dismantle and clean the egr system and will take some photos. It doesn’t have any symptoms of an issue like before but I want to see inside 😉👍

[Gerg]

19 hours ago, Mooly said:

I think I'll probably stick with E5 now.

Are you of the mindset that, in your case, you do have carbon build-up through excessive oil-burning, and that the plug problems and consequent poor running are resulting from that? 

Given the age of the car, running on E5 may well be enough of a 'workaround' to keep the car running 'til you choose to move it on.

Even so, as a possible line of attack to remove some of the carbon 'burden', there is this procedure, perhaps you've already seen it, this one from Sealey, which at least gives it some credibility uplift:

 

Here's a very cheap new unit on eBay, surprisingly cheap, in fact:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/224431624181?campid=5338627314&mkevt=1&mkcid=1&toolid=10050&customid=CjwKCAjwl6OiBhA2EiwAuUwWZQdm098qFvsSLPn_LnepE-WAQTWpyeKPM6QoPfDLA8P6Oc1TK0kUihoCj2wQAvD_BwE&mkrid=710-53481-19255-0&customid=CjwKCAjwl6OiBhA2EiwAuUwWZQdm098qFvsSLPn_LnepE-WAQTWpyeKPM6QoPfDLA8P6Oc1TK0kUihoCj2wQAvD_BwE&gclid=CjwKCAjwl6OiBhA2EiwAuUwWZQdm098qFvsSLPn_LnepE-WAQTWpyeKPM6QoPfDLA8P6Oc1TK0kUihoCj2wQAvD_BwE

An overview here of how the operator sees this method of carbon removal:

The view inside (picture in first panel of the link below) on this one suggests that the circuit board, basically, is just a power supply with a timer function.  Nothing special on the electrical side, Mooly, apart from the electrolysis-vessel hardware?  No VLSI surface-mount gubbins in this one!

ecarbonsolutions.co.uk/product/ecs-hdp-8000mk6/

Some of these claims are exaggerated for a 'normal' use, but I suspect it does work to an extent.

I called on a very local owner/operator of one of these rigs, for a quick chat, at his home, a couple of years back.  It's installed in his signwritten small peugeot van.  I'm not sure he's getting that much business out of it - his van is almost always outside his house, despite his having been selling the service for around 5 years.  He has other, unrelated, lines of work too, from what I can make out.  His online reviews for this service have many glowing recommendations. 

Naturally, a big placebo potential here.

All good fun, eh? 

What about going halves on the cheap one, Tony?!? 

[Gerg]

I was doing some compression tests on an A-series engined classic Mini the other day, it made the plugs in these Toyota engines look a touch awkward to get to by comparison - in the Mini they almost hand them over to you.

Then a couple of days later I saw this:

https://www.carscoops.com/2023/04/bugatti-veyrons-20000-plug-and-coil-replacement-is-no-easy-task/

That's why I'd never buy one.

 

[Mooly]

1 hour ago, Gerg said:

Are you of the mindset that, in your case, you do have carbon build-up through excessive oil-burning, and that the plug problems and consequent poor running are resulting from that? 

That seems a logical assumption seeing as a couple of the plugs had pretty large chunks of carbon wrapped around the insulator nose. Pretty big chunks when you poked them and they fell out.

A few years ago the independent garage I use was offering this:

https://www.terraclean.co.uk/about.php

Although I haven't seen it promoted for a while.

I think while its running well I'll leave well alone for now... can see your latest post... I used to have a Mini 1000, P reg (P at the end) complete with see through floors etc. Happy days.

 

[Mooly]

8 minutes ago, Gerg said:

That's why I'd never buy one.

Wonder if he angle tightened the new plugs and found they weren't quite tight enough. Ooops, time to do it all again.

 

[TonyHSD]

I am not after any carbon cleaning on the engine. Just the usual egr system clean up and pcv valve replacement, well known things on our cars and nothing else other than regular service. I believe that less we try to fix anything that actually doesn’t need fixing the longer the cars will last and less trouble will bring to us. 👍