Sean1980

A couple of days ago I went against my better judgement and filled my truck up with the " may contain up to 10% ethanol" gas. After about 40 or so miles I notice a slight clatter. Then yesterday I am pulling my Polaris ranger with the cruise set, locked in 4th doing about 60 mph. I start to go up a pretty decent hill and once the engine gets under a pretty good load it starts rattling like crazy and there is a haze coming out of the exhaust. I stop the cruise control coast to the top of the hill, turn around and head home. I let the truck sit for a while and checked the oil. Oil is full and had no water in it. Need some of the guys who know more about this kind of stuff to enlighten me. Could this be the gas? It has a flexfuel engine in it so I think it shouldn't be. But, like I said, I need some more expert advice on this. Or, do I have a more serious problem that is going to rear it's ugly head when I am 100 miles from home pulling my Ranger to go play? Thanks in advance

violinguy77

The clattering sound is strange. It could be detonation due to bad gas and the haze from the tail pipe might be an indicator of this. I would expect detonation as your RPMS climb and the rate of clatter will coincide with the increase in RPMs. If your oil is good and there are no signs of dilution I would blame it on the gas. Did you get a check engine light?
As for the gas you should really stick with top tier Gasoline. I don't know of anywhere her in the Houston area that you can get "pure" gas. Every Shell station I go to has that sticker as do the Chevron and Exxon stations. Keep us posted and good luck!

Sean1980

I'm glad to hear at least one idea on it being the gas. It was a little mom and pop joint that I always drive by but the other day I needed gas and it was convenient. I'm hoping that is all it is because I sure do love this truck. Either way, there will never be anything run in it again but the good stuff. If that is not what it is and I have bigger problems, I will post and let guys on here know what the dealer says about it. Thanks. And if anyone else has ideas on what this is, please post.

Woods0319

Since moving down here to Florida from Alaska Ive had no choice but to fill up with gas that "may contain 10% ethanol". I myself haven't had any issues or usual noise. Almost every gas station I go to here on the panhandle has the ethanol disclaimer on it. Suck that I cant get away from it....

terraformer

I'm in Iowa, pretty much the genesis of the ethanol substance, and I avoid it whenever I can. I just pay more for the "good" stuff - sometimes I go 87 octane, sometimes 92 - depending on the bank account at the time

redfred

I have a 2012 5.0 and have not had the clattering issue with mine and i generally run 87 octane with the 10% ethanol since that's about all that is in my area of Oklahoma. I have to agree your problem, does sound like a bad gas/water situation. Good luck

Sean1980

Yeah, I think that is exactly what it was. I have since, run 5 or so tanks through the truck locally and even made a run down to south Mississippi and have had no issues. So, surely it just had to be a bad spot of gas or something. I know whenever it happened, the "PUCKER FACTOR" went through the roof. Everything seems good now though. Thanks for the responses.

blakers213

Glad you figured it out. I wouldn't go back to that gas station.

Sean1980

OK. ROUND 2 of this little issue. To give all the facts, the first time this happened I was running the exhaust and intake in my sig. The day it happened I put everything back to stock just in case my truck had to go to the shop. After a month or so of no issues with the truck, I thought what the heck, I have that magnaflow exhaust sitting in my garage doing nothing. So, I put it back on and it has operated flawlessly for over a month now. This weekend I was in my garage and looked over and thought what the heck, I have that airraid jr. kit just sitting there doing nothing. So, I put it back on. I thought my problem was bad gas. I went out to get my daughter some ice cream a few hours, and there it was, the dam valves started to clatter again. What's going on with this fellas? I have never had a vehicle that wouldn't accept changes to the intake or exhaust. I am extremely confused and somewhat terrified that I have some underlying problem that the intake is just highlighting. Does this sound like anything that anyone else has experienced? Thanks again for any advice or ideas on this. The intake is no longer on the truck and it runs great. No noise.

violinguy77

Sounds like the vehicle reaches operating temperature and you hear this clattering sound. Have you been able to put a stethoscope on it to determine if the noise is coming from the top or the bottom of the block? Does it happen at idle or only during drive time? If you had a programmer that could data log that might help. I would say take it to the dealer but we all know how that goes. You drop it off and the guy in the clown pants says "we couldn't reproduce it". That's shop speak for "not really worth our time today". I assume you are under warranty, you could always drive it around in 1st gear until it goes BOOM!

Just Kidding

Or not?

I really wish you luck and keep us posted, we'll keep chiming in.