When I climb a steep grade in my GS-R, I hear mild pinging for about a second until the ECU backs off the ignition timing. Is it okay for the engine to ping briefly like this every time I hit a grade?

The Integra brochure says that 91 octane is recommended and that lower grades can be used with reduced performance. Is Honda saying that since there's a knock sensor, I don't have to worry about pinging?

 

no detonation is good, if u are running lower grade fuel try using the better stuff, or retard the timing a little bit.


[Modified by sohc_boy, 7:56 AM 7/31/2001]

 

Is it okay? Yeah, as long as you don't mind rebuilding your engine later on. If you hear pings, that means that there are pings you don't hear. That means there's a whole lotta detonation going on in your engine that can bend valves, destroy pistons, mess up your rings & cylinder walls, etc. Like sohc_boy said, if you're running a lower grade fuel, upgrade. If you're running 91 octane then you probably have a fuel or ignition problem that you should address.

 

hey mercury,

first off, you wont need to rebuild your engine jus cause of mild pining. pining does not equal detnation like dave 421 said. detonation will cause a lot of damage to your engine when you dont fix the problem that causes all the detonation. ok, mild pinging isnt bad at all, a lot of the times i hear a car goin up a hill knocking which is basically a severe pinging. even tho they run past the 100,000 mile mark without needing to rebuild their engine. the OCTANE rating or level is the culprit of pinging. if your owners manual tells you to use 91 octane, you should use a gas with atleast 91 octane or you will hear some pinging under load, IE goin up hill. also when youre goin up will what rpm are you at??? if you at a low rpm, lets say around 1000 - 1500rpm, you will hear pinging, so try to keep your rpm's up a bit higher. if youre in first gear and with the clutch fully engaged and your engine is turning around those low rpm, try slipping your clutch a bit to keep the rpms up higher, lets say around 2000 and above. if you do that i asure you that you will not hear that ugly ping in the engine. only do this if you are annoyed of that nasty noise, and if not let it ping, its not gonna kill the engine. i have a 89 camry with over 160,000 miles on it, it used to ping like hell cause my mom doesnt give a **** about octane ratings, even after all those miles its running strong. even after my abuse its running really well. mild pinging not a bad thing.

 

A ping is an uncontrolled explosion internally. Probably not good but in your case probably not to bad. Step up the octane and retard a degree or so.

 

I didn't say that what he's getting now means he has to rebuild his engine next week. The point is, if nothing is done about it, pinging will lead to damage. And, pinging IS detonation in the chambers. Your camry may be running fine now but you also fixed the problem by upgrading the fuel, didn't you? If you would have kept putting lower octane in, do you still think you would be running without a problem???

 

Just so that people know, I always put 91 or 92 octane gasoline into the car, so it's either an injector problem, fuel pressure problem, carbon deposit problem. I've got a new MSD 6A with a Blaster coil, new distributor cap, rotor, wires, and plugs, so ignition probably isn't the problem.

I've heard that the way to test for pinging is to floor the throttle while going up a steep gear in too high of a gear, and yes, I do get pinging when I do this. Not that I normally drive like such an idiot, but I figured that any pinging is bad.

Since I can't hear anything when I rev up the engine at WOT (sure is noisy at 8200RPM!), does anyone think that my engine would possibly still be pinging when it's in the fat part of the powerband?

My more pressing question is if I'm getting this slight pinging under heavy load, will this slight pinging turn into more serious pinging or even a knocking if I put a 5 psi GReddy turbo kit on it?

 

if you put a turbo on your car you will have to do something about controlling fuel and spark anyway so you should be able to tune it out at that point. If you don't you will blow your motor for sure.

 

Pinging is NOT detonation. yes it is simalar but it is not the same. if you think pinging is detonation then what is knocking? i guess its same as pinging and therefor its detonation right? pinging is a very mild case of detonation, then there is knocking and last there is detonation. all those three is not the same, simalar yes but not the same.

 

what is pinging and knocking from the motor??

 

Read what you just said...

Is an Integra an Acura? Yes. Does that mean that an Acura is an Integra? No. It's kinda logic here. Pinging is detonation but that doesn't mean that all detonation is pinging. Got it?

 

Dave421,

pinging is not detonation. if you think pinging is detonation then what is preignition or knocking? i bet they're detonation as well. all of them are simalar but not the same, they all have different meaning which im not sure of but i no for sure that pinging is not detonation. pinging is a very mild case of detonation but they are not the same like you said.

 

Ok, here we go again. #1, I never said they were the same. If something is a "mild case of" anything else, then by definition, that means that it is that thing. Like my previous post said, an Integra is an Acura, right? That does not mean that an Acura is necessarily an Integra. Follow? It's the same problem here. Pinging is detonation ("a mild case of"). THAT DOES NOT MEAN DETONATION IS PINGING. No, they are not one and the same but PINGING IS DETONATION (whether it be a mild case of it, a sign of it, or whatever).

OK?

Hey, how about this one. Heard of Diet Coke? Is it Coke? Yeah, it's just missing some stuff. Pinging is detonation just not as big. I don't know. Maybe I'm just wasting my breath...uh, finger power here.





[Modified by Dave421, 2:00 PM 8/2/2001]

 

i'm on dave421's side here. on my car when it was turbo'd it had a lil pinging under load at wot, i would say it had detonation and that's because i pulled my plugs to chk and they were pitted pretty nicely (and they were 2 heat ranges colder).

 

when you or anyone else says, something is something then that ususally mean that they are the same. in the automotive world you can go around saying this is that and that is this since it will me they are the same. coke and diet coke, diet coke isnt really coke cause of the diet. its simalar but not the same. something IS something means the same. acura is to an integra??? i think you should have said integra is to a type r to get your point straight. if you had said that then i would have understand what youre trying to get at, but you didnt. anyways, lets jus call it even and think what we think about pinging etc and jus let the others do what they want to do with their car. i dont really care its not my car. finger power?? haha ok

 

Okay, I'm going to interpret all of the above as:

A little pinging isn't all that bad, so I'm going to leave it alone for now. Allow the engine to rev up more and slip the clutch more to avoid overloading the engine.

My spark plugs that have gone through 30000mi don't look strange and definitely don't have any pitting in them, so I think I'm ok.

If I hear louder or more persistent pinging, I'll get down to some tuning.

Thanks guys!

 

how do you fix something like that. is because of the knock sensor? or wirings.