More problems for my gt4!! hooray..not

[danny2]

here's one for the problemsolvers out there..

car: celica gt4 3sgte st185

- car idles rough when warm, i have changed oil,plugs,leads, checked dizzy, looked for vacuum leaks, checked all sensors/ecu, compression is 180-190psi all round..

- when car is started cold it hesitates/stumbles like its going to die for about 5 seconds and then revs nicely to warm up.. not rough when warming up.. i'm guessing this might be a little bit of water in one of the cylinders..

- havn't driven car much, but i noticed coolant was very low in radiator when i bought it, when i run it for a while coolant seems to drop a tiny bit.. there is no white smoke i can see.. i have noticed a bit of water out of the tail pipe on startup, nothing much though.. oil is clean not milky..also there are no leaks i can find..


my guesses are

- possible blown head gasket between the cylinders or something..

- cracked head.. compression was fine though?

- some simple thing i have overlooked.


anybody had similar symptoms to mine?

[blacktop]

if you give it a bit of stick does it sound like a tin rattling on higher RPM?

[danny2]

can't hear any pinging.. timing is set to 12 degrees.. if i get under it it doesn't do much, it's quite slow.. but i havn't driven another near stock gt4 before so its hard to say if its normal.. certainly a turtle compared to a cordia vr4

[blacktop]

to me, it sounds like BHG, how much steam on start up if any (get someone else to start the car), have you checked the oil filler cap carefully? can you see any wet spots on your radiator? (as this might explain low coolent levels), how or who did the pressure test? was the car cold when pressure tested?

after you answer all of these questions I probably still don't have an answer for you, but it will get you closer to the source of the problem.

[danny2]

will check oil filler cap.. no wet spots on radiator and i checked the compression when it was warm as this was the way i was showed to do it.. and thanks for your suggestions

[blacktop]

I miss read your compression test, i meant cooling pressure test, i would strongly suggest this be done, if you have access to the right equipment, it is very easy, when the cooling system is cooled, attach the pressurizing thingo and pump to specified mark, then look for leaks and watch the gauge to see if it drops, it should give you some result in about 2 or 3 minute, if not your car should be fine.

[spectral]

Is the ECU spitting out any codes?

Doesn't explain water loss, but if its a faulty sensor, the codes will tell you. Such as the temp sensor in the AFM giving strange readings and the ECU compensating wrongly.

[TC1600]

To check for a blown head gasket, take out the spark plugs (not the easiest thing on a GT4 granted), pressurise the cooling system for a few minutes, then crank the engine over and see if any water comes out of the spark plug holes. This will tell you which cylinder the coolant is leaking into and how much.

One other possibility is a blocked/leaking injector, but if its dribbling a bit to cause rough running there will usually be a puff of black smoke from the exhaust until it clears.

[Andrew162]

does the engine overheat? or get up to temp real quickly? I had a similar problem with my 3S-GTE and it was a miniscule crack inside one of the exhaust ports in #2 cyl... thus allowing water to seep through the head via the valvetrain.

[danny2]

ecu says all is fine..

will try and get a cooling test done after i flush the system with that muwkowt stuff..

engine gets pretty hot, after 10 mins of giving it a medium to hard time water is coming out of the overflow, but temp is around normal, it does seem to get hot faster than what i'm used to.. i have to look at thermostat..

andrew162, i think i too have got a crack somewhere in the head, how much did your coolant drop after a normal drive? and did your car start normally when cold?? or did it hesitate for a little?

cheers guys

[Andrew162]

funny thing about mine is that it would nearly empty the radiator (maybe 1L or so) and push it all back out into the reserve bottle. when I smelled coolant, I knew it was time to get out of the car, empty the reserve bottle back into the radiator (once it had cooled a little) and drive on for another 20km's in city traffic... until it did it again. finally I got sick of this and got around to pulling the head off and getting it patched up (unless you're Neal Bates, good 3S-GTE heads are a bit harder to come by these days).

I thought thermostat was the issue as well, but it was a TRD 71* thermostat in there, and tested it fine. mine started up ok in the morning, no splutters, but it did get rather hot quicker once it had completed the warm-up process.

[danny2]

cheers andrew.. i'll look into it tomorrow, and let you's know the outcome

[Cruiser97_80]

Your hesitating problem could be a fuel pressure problem also.

[danny2]

fuel pressure?.. it only hesitates on startup, although it didn't really do it this morning and there was no steam water out of the tail pipe.. bugger if i know!