Rav T180 Excessive Diesel Knock And Stalling Problems

[Bizz]

My 06 T180 Rav is having some weird problems.

When cold the engine will fire but will die straight away, this will happen 2 or 3 times before it will run but then the idle is all over the place, hunting up and down for about 15 seconds then it may settle down.

I also have excessive diesel knock when accelerating in low gears and even when pulling away, this diesel knock seems to be getting worse.

My dealer has had the Rav for two weeks before Xmas and they changed the fuel filter and a new set of injectors. This seemed to sort it out for a few weeks or so but now the hunting has started again and so has the stalling.

Has anyone else had any similar promlems or any ideas of what it may be.

[rav man]

My 06 T180 Rav is having some weird problems.

When cold the engine will fire but will die straight away, this will happen 2 or 3 times before it will run but then the idle is all over the place, hunting up and down for about 15 seconds then it may settle down.

I also have excessive diesel knock when accelerating in low gears and even when pulling away, this diesel knock seems to be getting worse.

My dealer has had the Rav for two weeks before Xmas and they changed the fuel filter and a new set of injectors. This seemed to sort it out for a few weeks or so but now the hunting has started again and so has the stalling.

Has anyone else had any similar promlems or any ideas of what it may be.

*********************************

Bizz,

Haven't had any problems with stalling but do have a bit of a nasty sounding diesel clatter when cold, in my XT4 D4D 2.2 which is the same engine. I have driven a Verso 2.2 which sounded the same so not too worried about the noise. Mine quietens down when warm. Rich.

[spwolfx]

hard to say as it can be noisy, how noisy is yours?

[Bizz]

hard to say as it can be noisy, how noisy is yours?

I think it is very noisy, I took a mechanic out in out over the weekend and he said that he was very surprised that it was doing it at all. Even at a constant throttle position when accelerating the knock sometimes comes and goes as if the pump can't make up it's mind.

[Bizz]

Update to starting problem.

My wife has just rung to say that when she started the Rav today she thought she would see how many times it would stall before keeping running. After it stalling 6 times she gave up and used the throttle to try and keep it going, hooray it kept running, until she took her foot off the throttle, then it stalled again. After starting it again for the 8th time she had to rev it for a couple of minutes before it would stay running.

The Rav has only just gone over to 3000 miles, I am not very impressed to say the least.

[GT4 BOOSTER]

Purely my theory but it sounds like the pump timing is maybe out. running lean , this answers the knocking too , have a diesel fitter maybe put a new timing belt on and time it all up properly.

[chatman]

Purely my theory but it sounds like the pump timing is maybe out. running lean , this answers the knocking too , have a diesel fitter maybe put a new timing belt on and time it all up properly.

Seeing a few problems of late with the T180 RAV's...... :( :( :(

What with leaking water and not starting even bits falling off....

[Bizz]

Purely my theory but it sounds like the pump timing is maybe out. running lean , this answers the knocking too , have a diesel fitter maybe put a new timing belt on and time it all up properly.

I was thinking along the lines of this, I'm speaking to the dealer today.

[Steve@Aberdeen]

Purely my theory but it sounds like the pump timing is maybe out. running lean , this answers the knocking too , have a diesel fitter maybe put a new timing belt on and time it all up properly.

Isn't the 2.2 D4D chain driven (i.e. no timing belt)? Besides, injection timing should be managed by the ECU - Mr T should be able to hook his 'puter up and diagnose it fairly quickly. To me, it sounds like a dodgy accelerator control.

[anchorman]

Purely my theory but it sounds like the pump timing is maybe out. running lean , this answers the knocking too , have a diesel fitter maybe put a new timing belt on and time it all up properly.

Isn't the 2.2 D4D chain driven (i.e. no timing belt)? Besides, injection timing should be managed by the ECU - Mr T should be able to hook his 'puter up and diagnose it fairly quickly. To me, it sounds like a dodgy accelerator control.

I agree with Steve. The 2.2 is chain driven and there is something more sinister at the heart of this.

Whatever you do, getting a third party at this stage to do any work on the vehicle will be suicide. It could cost a huge amount of money (I believe a fuel pump is £2/3000) and the best way of getting Toyota to walk away is to let someone else work on it. If you are very lucky (if you know what I mean) it will be just drawing air which will cause the stalling, bad running and knock. Failing that it is either in the control (ECU) or hardware and I would let Mr T sort it out.

As one reply says, they are a bit prone to diesel knock which comes with most common rail diesels but I thought the D-CATS were a bit quieter. I presume what you are saying is that it knocks more now than when you first got it?

Regards

[Bizz]

I have not let anyone else work on it, I just took a mechanic out for a drive for him to hear the knock. The only people to have touched it is the dealer and when they connect it up the the diagnostic machine it says all is fine.

The Rav is going back to the dealer in the morning, this will be attempt No 3 at fixing it.

The demo which I took out before I placed my order did not have the same knock mine has at all, that is now sold and they don't have another one for me to try. I have heard diesel knock before and expected it, but this sounds like someone is banging a tin tray about in the engine bay and you can feel it.

By the way, car is 6 months old and has done 3000 miles.

[anchorman]

I have not let anyone else work on it, I just took a mechanic out for a drive for him to hear the knock. The only prople to have touched it is the dealer and when they connect it up the the diagnostic machine it says all is fine.

The Rav is going back to the dealer in the morning, this will be attempt No 3 at fixing it.

The demo which I took out before I placed my order did not have the same knock mine has at all, that is now sold and they don't have another one for me to try. I have heard diesel knock before and expected it, but this sounds like someone is banging a tin tray about in the engine bay and you can feel it.

By the way, car is 6 months old and has done 3000 miles.

Thankfully I have not heard any other complaints of this nature. Please keep us informed of progress.

Good luck for tomorrow.

[Steve@Aberdeen]

...

By the way, car is 6 months old and has done 3000 miles.

I wish I could do as few miles - mine is 4 months old and approaching 7000 miles.

I must admit, the D4D is a bit rattly at times - more than the BMW block in my previous Freelander TD4. However, having owned diesels for the past 20 years (the majority of which had PSA engines), there can be a lot of variation. It's usually more noticeable either on start-up, tick-over or when pulling hard, though my wife's previous Suzuki Grand Vitara (with a 2 litre PSA unit) rattled on over-run.

One afterthought - a diesel engine should start quickly and not easily stall - it used to be the case (when diesels were controlled mechanically) that poor diesel starting would mean checking a) the glow plugs, then B) the injectors, and only once those were found OK, c) the pump. Nowadays, we tend to blame the ECU first (as I did) as it's relatively easy for the garage to check with their 'puter.

[Bizz]

My wife dropped the Rav at the dealers today and was very shocked to find that Toyota had seen my post on here and contacted the service manager. They have told him what they think will sort the problem and I will let you know more when I do.

Thank you Toyota, that is the sort of service I have been looking for, if it works.

[chatman]

My wife dropped the Rav at the dealers today and was very shocked to find that Toyota had seen my post on here and contacted the service manager. They have told him what they think will sort the problem and I will let you know more when I do.

Thank you Toyota, that is the sort of service I have been looking for, if it works.

There is a user called Toyota_PR that frequents these forums from time to time....maybe they are looking Lets hope TOYOTA CUSTOMER CARE (use the last two words loosely) take note...

[anchorman]

I have absolutely no doubt that the dealers and TGB monitor this site and have worked out who is who.

I don't think it does any harm for them to know how we feel, both good and bad.

It can also work against us if they thing that a post may spark an expensive epidemic, e.g. the NCAP saga.

Regards

[Bizz]

The dealer rang on Friday and said they had carried out the work Toyota had advised them to do. They wanted to keep it until today so they could start it from cold to make sure all was well. The service manager rang and said all was perfect, so my wife will pick it up later today and I will let you know the outcome.

[Bizz]

All seems well, I have not had a chance to test fully as I have only driven it to work a couple of times. Will let you know all after a good drive at the weekend and will post what was actually wrong.

[chatman]

All seems well, I have not had a chance to test fully as I have only driven it to work a couple of times. Will let you know all after a good drive at the weekend and will post what was actually wrong.

Must have been able to start from COLD as it's been FREEZING.....

[anchorman]

All seems well, I have not had a chance to test fully as I have only driven it to work a couple of times. Will let you know all after a good drive at the weekend and will post what was actually wrong.

Can you tell us what was wrong?

[Bizz]

Latest update is that the starting and tickover now seem to be sorted and the Rav feels like it has more power now but it still has really bad knock when accelerating hard in a low gear. I need to go on a longer test run as I have not had a chance to yet.

The dealer was told by Toyota to re-set the diesel pump timing and this is what seems to have sorted the stalling and tickover.

The knock that I have is really weird as you can feel it, like it is a vibration rather than knock. I get the normal diesel knock that gets louder as you put your foot down but then I get a really loud erratic knock which has really taken the enjoyment out of driving, people look round and expect to see a 15 year old Tranny van but see a 27.5K Toyota instead.

I have not been back to the dealer yet as I want to get what is now a third opinion on the knock. There is one other 180 that I know of locally so I may try and contact him and see if I can go out in his with him to see if it has the same knock, I think he comes on here.

[gcparris]

That's quite interesting Bizz. We've had our '06 RAV4 T180 for about 6 months now. It's done about 12,000 miles. Last week we got it back from it's first service costing £170 from our local Toyota Dealer here in Bishops Stortford, Herts. Before the service it had been "knocking" hard as you have been stating, however we've not experienced any problems with stalling. Since the service nothing has changed with regard to the "knocking" it's as bad as ever. As I've never had a diesel car before I just assumed that this was normal, but it is noisey and I agree it can be physically felt! I'm now tempted to take it back to the dealer to discuss this further.

Gareth Parris.

AF06 VSM

Latest update is that the starting and tickover now seem to be sorted and the Rav feels like it has more power now but it still has really bad knock when accelerating hard in a low gear. I need to go on a longer test run as I have not had a chance to yet.

The dealer was told by Toyota to re-set the diesel pump timing and this is what seems to have sorted the stalling and tickover.

The knock that I have is really weird as you can feel it, like it is a vibration rather than knock. I get the normal diesel knock that gets louder as you put your foot down but then I get a really loud erratic knock which has really taken the enjoyment out of driving, people look round and expect to see a 15 year old Tranny van but see a 27.5K Toyota instead.

I have not been back to the dealer yet as I want to get what is now a third opinion on the knock. There is one other 180 that I know of locally so I may try and contact him and see if I can go out in his with him to see if it has the same knock, I think he comes on here.

[anchorman]

Interesting, as far as I know, the timing is totally controlled by the ECU and information from the flywheel sensor. Did anything occur prior to it going wrong? I.e., did you stall it or make a really rough gearchange (or anyone else who drove it!).

Just a couple of other things to consider.

Bizz. With yours, have you checked that nothing attached to the engine like the exhaust or air filter housing etc is touching the bodywork. It will transmit an almighty din to the cabin if it is. Can you feel more vibration through the gearstick than you can from the steering wheel?

I know that the gearbox is a weak spot but these things also have a dual mass flywheel that causes problems on 4.2's and a fault may upset the timing.

You could have more than one fault and whatever is the root cause of the vibration has cocked up the timing and they have simply rectified the syptom but not the cause.

gcparris

They all make an unbelievable knocking noise if you run them on supermarket or regular diesel. I was astonished at the difference in noise after adding BP Ultra or Shell Extra. I think Esso and Total do it but I have not tried any. If you'll pardon the pun - don't "knock" until you've tried it! Let the low fuel warning light to come on for as long as you can before filling up and don't forget that these companies all sell regular diesel which won't make any difference. The good stuff costs about 5 or 6p a litre more which is a good clue.

[Steve@Aberdeen]

They all make an unbelievable knocking noise if you run them on supermarket or regular diesel. I was astonished at the difference in noise after adding BP Ultra or Shell Extra. I think Esso and Total do it but I have not tried any. If you'll pardon the pun - don't "knock" until you've tried it! Let the low fuel warning light to come on for as long as you can before filling up and don't forget that these companies all sell regular diesel which won't make any difference. The good stuff costs about 5 or 6p a litre more which is a good clue.

AFAIK, Shell, whose I usually buy because it's the cheapest around here, only do the one grade of derv. BP is my usual alternative and they certainly do two grades - the standard one (which is usually a pence or two dearer per litre than Shell) seems about the same on mileage, etc; I've never tried their dearer grade.

I'm not aware of derv choices from Esso, Jet, etc, though they may have them by now (I so rarely visit their forecourts to notice). As far as supermarket grades - I recall I once bought from Asda because my tank was running low and theirs was the only forecourt before joining a motorway. I don't recall noticing any knocking or degredation in performance - but I probably used most of that fill on the motorway.

I tried Rix (5% bio) a few times in my previous Freelander TD4 - a bit dearer and didn't notice any difference in economy or performance. Hardly seemed worth paying more for just 5% bio.

Diesels know - my wife's previous Suzuki Grand Vitara (with the 2litre PSA HDi block in it) had a typical diesel growl when under power but always rattled when off load and on overrun. It did that when new and 5 years later when sold at 70,000 miles.

[clare]

Anchorman is spot on with his Derv assesment. Shell and BP are streets ahead of Supermarket Derv. I think we,ve talked about this on a similar post a while since

Clare