[Dennis]

Here's what the Ford engineer told me today:
"The 4.6L's have switched the piston to a smaller, lighter, higher performance shorter skirt piston that is designed to perfectly fit a warm engine. There may be noise when the engine is cold for the first few minutes. This is normal, hence, there is no fix for cold engine knock planned or in place. The noise you hear causes absolutely no wear and tear."
Here's what I said...
"Yeah, but the noise I get is LOUD...like the engine is coming apart, I can't believe there's no wear, and is there from 2,700-4,000 until the temp guage is mid. arc, which usually takes at least 15 minutes of warm-up.
90% of my driving is 20 minutes hops at the beginning and end of 12 hour shifts, so 90% of the time I'm either short-shifting or letting the car warm up 15 minutes for a 20 minute drive."
His reply...
"It could be that your car has the noise louder than most. We'll have to meet when your engine's warm so I can hear it in person."
Seems we keep going around in circles. I had left my car overnight at Ford in October so the mechanic and foreman-supervisor could hear the knock. Now we're back to this again. I'll keep you all posted.

 

[Dennis]

<TABLE BORDER=0 ALIGN=CENTER WIDTH=85%><TR><TD><font size=-1>Quote:</font><HR></TD></TR><TR><TD><FONT SIZE=-1><BLOCKQUOTE>
On 2002-01-09 00:32, DrivingSimulators wrote:
Dennis,

Someone on this BBS (a big engine diesel mech?) mentioned that you can check for engine wear problems by analyzing the oil. He said it was very accurate, and could determine precisely where the wear was coming from (based on metal analysis). </BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR></TD></TR></TABLE>

Thanks, yes, I remember that helpful post and I mentioned it to the Ford Service manager. He said, "There will be no wear on this type of noise that could possibly show anything with an oil analysis. That type of thing is only done on large fleet vehicles so the owners can keep track of them better through time.
So I said,"It won't help at all? I mean it can't hurt to do it can it?"
And he said "Nope, it won't help at all"
I'm not saying I believed him, but he basically refused to do it for me. I have no idea how much it would cost to do it myself but I'd consider doing it. Don't know if Ford would accept a thrid party's analysis, though.

_________________
Dennis
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<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: 1NastyFordGT on 2002-01-10 00:12 ]</font>