jpmustanggt

could somebody please explain how a piston goes bad? i have to pay 1700 bucks to fix mine.
thanks

josh_0351

What’s the scoop (year of your car, miles, etc)?

jpmustanggt

2001 mustang gt 47,000 miles with a full exhaust.

04BlueGT

Okay, more info:

1) What happend that caused you to see a mechanic?

2) Did the mechanic say 'piston'?

3) Do you know how he determined the problem? i.e., compression check, hooking up to the car's computer, etc.

jpmustanggt

sorry... there was a clicking noise when idling, when i rev'd it up the slightest bit it would stop. I determined that it was definetly an internal engine noise brought it to the local ford dealer and he said it was the piston. I thought it would have been a lifter or something.
No, I don't know exactly how he determined it.

04BlueGT

Fellas, correct me if I'm wrong here!

I seriously doubt that you've damaged a piston based on what you wrote.

If you have not noticed a loss of power, loss of oil or coolant, coolant in the oil, lots o smoke from the rear, then I doubt it is a piston or rings.

If you're worried about it, go buy/rent a compression tester. Unscrew, one at a time, each spark plug and thread in the compression tester and check all cylinders. If one is significantly lower than the others, then the rings are going.

Sounds like lifter tapping is what you have going on. If that is the deal, then instead of $1,700 to that yahoo, have the heads pulled, ported and polished, fix the lifter, and reinstall. That should cost less and give more. If you have the cash, throw in cams and springs.

I'll ask jdaniel what he thinks. He's pretty smart on the mod motors.

jdaniel

Hey, man! Its a lifter guarenteed. Me and SaleenSC281 just went through this with the exact same symptoms you are having. I told him I thought it was a floating valve. He wanted to take it to his tuner to have it looked at. The tuner used a scope and told him that his #1 piston was cracked and $9000 would get him a new built motor. Well, I called BS and he didnt have the money so he brought the car back here. He got a new engine for it off of Ebay or some forum. Before it got here, we started to disassemble the old motor. As I took off the passanger side valve cover, I noticed that a rocker arm was missing and sure enough it was laying in the bottom of the head. We got the timing chain cover off and the head removed and there wasnt even a scar on the #1 piston!!! If I were you I would take the valve covers off before you take it back to the dealer and see for your self if it is a rocker arm that was knocked off. I bet you $100 its a rocker arm!

EDIT: We put the new motor, and tranny together and installed it all in one day and the car is now running great! Anyone need some P&P heads?

josh_0351

Blue is correct-a-mundo. I am kinda trying to decipher the same thing on my 2002 GT with 39,800 miles. When I changed the oil about a month ago, I was about a quart low. []

Well I’ve been using Pennzoil because that’s what I’ve always used without issue/or question. After looking into it further, Pennzoil is paraffin based and can cause excessive sludge build up (this, from several sources much more savvy with automotive mechanics than I).

So I switched to Mobil1 fully synthetic. I’ve also heard from reputable sources that running an engine hard during the summer months (i.e. extreme heat) coupled with the lower weight viscose oils (5W20) can cause excessive oil burn off. But the moral of the story is that I was sh!tting Tiffany cufflinks here very recently thinking that I had the same issue. Take the advise of some of the more experienced Cats around this site and get a second opinion before dropping nearly $2K @ the dealer for an overhaul. Hell, that’s ($2K) a good start on a 4V DOHC Cobra replacement motor!

jpmustanggt

thanks man!

jpmustanggt

you were so right, that was exactly what it was.