Thanks all! - pinging fixed...

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sasilverbullet

sasilverbullet

Joined
Aug 22, 2004
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Location
San Antonio, Texas
Just wanted to say thanks to everyone that responded to all my 70 Lincoln Mk III pinging issues. I assembled my toolkit and took it out on the highway and after 4 tries, got the pinging to go away completely! Of course I had to go to 0 TDC as indicated on the harmonic balancer to get the pinging out. It's supposed to be 12 degrees...

Yeah! Now I don't have to spend $11 per tank on octane booster!

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Rev up the engine while you pour in hot water down the carb to steam clean insides.It might loosen up carbon that's giving you problems.Google for this procedure.
 
Originally Posted By: oldmaninsc
Problem is - by retarding the timing you are fixing the symptom and not the cause.

+1 - and likely reducing the power considerably...(unless that is not an issue).
 
Sounds like compression ratio needs to come down a whole number or so.What is it stock,10:1?
 
Stock is 10.5:1. Yes, I know I'm treating the symptom - but with 365hp and 500 ft lbs of torque in it's 460, I have a lot of room to spare. It runs fine, was driving it for about 2 hours to make sure all is okay. And I've done the Sea Foam in the carb thing...
 
Originally Posted By: spasm3
Its possible the harmonic balancer is bad, and 0 degrees is not really 0 degrees.



THIS.

Easy way to verify TRUE TDC with a piston stop and some whiteout on the balancer. I ALWAYS do this.
 
That things gonna ping and rattle on todays pump gas unless he retards the timing like he did. Big bore, high compression etc. Too bad........Retarded timing will cause the engine to run hotter, exhaust valves to run much hotter and cause it to use more gas than it already does and have much less power.

If it was my car I would play with racing gas and pump gas mixed to get 95ish octaine and live with it that way.
 
I have never owned a car from the 60's and 70's that didn't ping. You really have to play with the timing to get it to stop. Fixing the cause is only temporary as it will return anyway(maybe not with todays gas).

Most of the pinging is caused from the already high compression and the piston tops being covered with carbon deposits that is igniting the fuel being dumped into the combustion chamber and as Chris142 said: big bore/high compression. The carbon has only raised the compression even higher.

This is the reason that fuel system cleaners were developed with PEA. This cleaner is to help reduce the carbon deposits in the combustion chamber.

Will it be enough to clean the gunk off of the pistons of a 1970 Lincoln? IDK! If it did, only then could the timing be brought closer to the factory spec. Which in turn would be more benefical I would think!
 
Last edited:
Originally Posted By: Chris142
That things gonna ping and rattle on todays pump gas unless he retards the timing like he did. Big bore, high compression etc. Too bad........Retarded timing will cause the engine to run hotter, exhaust valves to run much hotter and cause it to use more gas than it already does and have much less power.

If it was my car I would play with racing gas and pump gas mixed to get 95ish octaine and live with it that way.


I was toying with that idea - hard to justify to the wifey when I spend $75 to fill it up (20 gals prem), put 2oz of lead substitute in, and to add on that another $11 bottle of octane booster.

On the race gas - here's a link to a place about 1.5 hrs from here that sells racing gas. I just talked to them and they recommended a product called VP110 (USF2000 Spec Fuel - 54 GL Drum VP110). He said that it would be mixed at 25% and would eliminate the need for the lead substitute. It costs $8.33 a gal and the minimum order is a 54 gal drum.
link to VP110 racing gas Look for VP110 at the top of the page and you can click on the spec sheet.

With my timing retarded I'm down to around 9mpg - with the race gas I *should* get about 13mpg. If I drive 1000 miles with premium at $4 a gal and 25% VP110, that's $385.37. 1000 miles with just premium and 9mpg is $433.33.

Cost dif is a good selling point to the wifey, but where do I store a 54 gal drum (no garage any more) to keep it out of the elements? And what happens when I go on a trip?

I'm just going to run with the timing retarded for a couple of months to see how it runs. The race gas option will be a last resort.
 
How available is E85 in your area? You could "update" the fuel system components to run on E85, and then pinging wouldn't be an issue.

But first I'd verify TRUE TDC as I mentioned earlier using a piston stop.
 
Originally Posted By: sasilverbullet
Stock is 10.5:1. Yes, I know I'm treating the symptom - but with 365hp and 500 ft lbs of torque in it's 460, I have a lot of room to spare. It runs fine, was driving it for about 2 hours to make sure all is okay. And I've done the Sea Foam in the carb thing...



Sea foam is a crock of ****. Makes a good penetrating oil, not anything else. Its also a real good way to bend connecting rods, if you're into that kind of thing... :-p

And yes, you're pretty much treating the symptom the only immediately available way you can. I've done a lot to try to calm down the pinging in the 440 I rebuilt with 10.5:1 slugs (don't get me started on those particular slugs- biggest mistake I ever made in more ways than just the compression ratio). Re-curving the distributor can help preserve some efficiency while reducing the pinging, but its tricky. Your exhaust gas temps will be way up by retarding the timing, so be careful of torching an exhaust valve. Other solutions possible:

-Re-jet your carb to run on either straight E-85 or a mix of E-85 and ordinary E-10. However mixing to a consistent ratio is a royal pain, E-85 isn't available everywhere, AND you'd need to convert all rubber hoses in the system to fuel-injection grade hoses. Blah.

-Add aftermarket water injection. This is the tactic I was planning had I kept my 440 in routine use- the availble systems are pretty slick in their tunability about when the injection comes on and how much it pumps in. You re-fill them with regular old windshield washer fluid, since its mostly a water/alcohol blend anyway. An added benefit of water injection is that water-injected engines always keep a SPOTLESSLY clean combustion chamber.

-Religiously use octane booster. It adds to an already high fuel cost, and keeping the right blend is tricky.
 
Originally Posted By: sasilverbullet


I was toying with that idea - hard to justify to the wifey when I spend $75 to fill it up (20 gals prem), put 2oz of lead substitute in, and to add on that another $11 bottle of octane booster.



Your going to need a lot more octain booster! The bottle of octain booster usually says that it raises the octain 1 point..........That means that it takes 92 octain gas and makes it 92.1.

You will probly need 95+ octain to run this engine. Usually those cars had an air filter cover that would have said "premium fuel". Back in 70 with lead added Premium would have been more octain than todays 91-92. Todays Premium is more like yesterdays regular.

Now I'm not trying to be rude but part of owning an older car like this is paying the price for the fuel it requires. If you can't afford the fuel then you can't afford the car...Sell it to somebody with a packed wallet before you put a hole in a piston or burn the exhaust valves.

Often at this point people start thinking of a late model engine swap. Doing this swap will cost much more than a few gallons of race gas every week.

Even rebuilding the original engine with lower compression will cost a couple grand by the time your done with that project. Then you will be stuck with a gutless low compression big block gas hog.
 
Sounds like u either got alot of carbon on the pistons or u got a slipped harmonic balancer. Could have a bad vac advance can or wrong dist weights.

My 69 caddy doesnt ping on 93 octane gas and thats about 2 degrees advance from the stock timing.

Either way it shouldnt ping on 93 octane gas
 
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