Thoughts on pinging SVT Focus

My 2003 SVT Focus has a tune I purchased from FSWerks a few years ago. It improved the drivability, torque and throttle response. But it has been pinging on 2nd and 3rd gear pulls lately. I somewhat recently put in a quieter i.e. more restrictive resonator and muffler and I wonder if that changed the back pressure/combustion chamber temperature enough to start pinging. It was a full Magnaflow, now it is a bastardized Magnaflow exhaust.

I have put some fuel cleaner through the gas and have attempted Italian tune ups, but I always thought that was more for carbed cars. I don't drive it much and it has low mileage I suppose it could have carbon build up, how likely is that on a modernish fuel injected car?

I am just looking for a sanity check before I go back to the tuner. I suspect he will ask me to do some logging with the SCT tuner, but the last time I did that with another vendor it was a waste of time. Have you guys had luck with custom tunes delivered remotely? I would say my current tune is more out of the box then custom.

The last time I checked local dyno prices it was ~$200 per hour in the Bay Area. This does not make much sense for my stock SVT.

Yes I could go back to stock, I may end up doing that.

Randy Robles at FSWerks has been doing remote tunes for the various Focus engines for over a decade. I would suggest calling him.

Do you have any reason at all to suspect your motor mounts might be shot?

I have an 04 SVT (also stationed in the Bay Area) and was dismayed to hear (at least what I thought was pinging). It just didn't make any sense to me as the car is bog stock. I replaced a few maintenance items and the sound remained. Finally, I replaced the motor mounts because I was tired of the roughness. Once replaced, the "pinging" was gone.

Don't want to steer you down the wrong pan but thought I would share. best of luck.

Good idea on the motor mounts, maybe due anyways. As for the Italian tune up, it was more prevalent with carbs but all fuel injected stuff still develops carbon, fun fact the newest direct inject stuff does most! You could try a good old "Chinese water torture" google it, it made my Pistons on my old Miata look brand new and it had 140k miles.

Regarding Randy at FSWerks, I will give him a call. He has been helpful in the past and it is good to know the remote tuning does work.

Regarding motor mounts: in the last two year I replaced the rear and passenger side mounts. The passenger side mount made an immense difference is quieting the rattles on the car. I have not done the drivers side yet.

I seafoamed the car - 1/3 of the bottle through the vacuum lines (broke not one, but two factory vacuum tees) then dumped the rest of the bottle into the tank. Almost no smoke at all. I gave it an Italian tune up for a while, hard pulls uphills, 0-60's on the highway, etc... and ... the pinging appears to have disappeared.

So the question is, did the Seafoam actually clean out my engine or I am getting a false positive because the Seafoam ingredients in the tank are acting as an octane booster? Could there be toluene or something similar in Seafoam that would give me a noticeable octane boost?

Wouldn't boost octane enough, probably cleaned off carbon that was causing hot spots and thus pinging. FYI even octane boosters that "boost octane by 8 points!" That .8 so now your 93 is now 93.8 so nothing basically. Btw what gas are you using? Name brand 93?

Are you sure it is pinging?

Could it be the cat falling apart and rattling?

I think I would pull the plugs and take a look at them. Also might check the fuel pressure. Are the wires to your crank and cam sensor good (mine melted in the heat of the header and corroded)? Finally, check the cooling system?

In reply to chiodos: Chevron 91. In CA so, sadly, sadly no 93 available. But my tune is for 91, when another vendor gave me a 93 tune that car was really unhappy at revs, mucho detinationato.

In reply to Robbie: I will check the wires to the sensors, and I have never noticed anything close to overheating on the cooling system. I changed most of the hoses and the waterpump a while ago, but in miles it was less than 10K ago.

It sure felt like pinging but I never had a cat fail to the point of rattling, this car is not one to hold back on throwing codes when there is a valid problem so I would expect some cat codes if it was crapping out.

I suspect whatever the issue may be, the muffler didn't cause it, it just let you hear it.

Reinstall, hook up or replace the knock sensor.

Try some octane boost.

I am in Redwood City. I think it may have something to do with the fuel we have available. Both of my cars started pinging and knocking after years of no such noises. I notice it seems worse if the car sits for a few days.