How to Fix a Knocking Engine Rod: Detailed Guideline (2023)

You always want a perfect engine and a soothing atmosphere while driving. But if you hear a strange noise continuously coming out of your engine, it’s risky and unpleasant, right? This is probably caused by an imbalanced rod, knocking while it rotates inside the engine bay.

This faint knocking sound makes the environment disquiet. For being an undisturbed driver, you must learn how to fix a knocking engine rod, otherwise, your engine will never be the same.

Rods can damage without giving any warning. Your vehicle can run for 6 months with the sound, although it will blow your engine eventually.

Grime from the bottom of your gas tanks comes through the pipe into the engine and creates a rod knocking sound. Continuous knocks turn into a big deal sometimes.

It makes the engine’s piston exhausted. Bearing gets out of order very quickly, rods get jammed, thrown rods get discharged from the crankshaft. Sometimes ignoring this little noise can be a reason for creating a hole in the engine.

What is Rod knock?

Your engine has a piston that moves up and down frictionless with the rods. Engine oil keeps moving and rotating smoothly. When it is played excessively, oil is famished. Due to oil starvation, rods become damaged and the bearings get destroyed.

When a rod becomes flail, it injures the crank journal surface. That rod knocks with other rods and makes noise while moving.

Grime in your tanks makes this noise when they get into the engine anyhow. Another thing is piston slap. There is a wrist pin that holds the piston and rod together. When any wear stroke on that pin, the piston becomes loose and wobbles inside the engine. This makes extra noise.

Why does this happen?

Your engine’s piston is connected with a spark plug and crankshaft. These two are connecting to the rod. Rods are bolted on the bottom around the crank with metal bearings. When the bearings are destroyed, these Rod Knocks happen.

Hard driving

If you drive hard, your engine’s bearing sometimes creates a spun. When the spun spins around the rod, the bearing position is moved by the spun-rod friction. It creates rod knocking.

Stretching rod bolts

Improper rod bolts stretch during driving. These bolts torque inside the engine and makes noises.

Characteristics of knocking engine rods

Rod knock sounds like tapping, sometimes banging or sparking wear noises. No matter how it sounds, first, you have to be sure that if the sound is harmful or not.

Rod knocking sound keeps happening whether your engine is warm or cold. It does not make any difference whether your engine is under load or light.

If the sound stops after increasing speed or warming up the engine, then this is probably not a rod knock.

This noise emerges from deep inside the motor. When you gyre up the engine or let gas get released, it becomes louder.

Due to continuous frictional force, the engine seizes up. This could be one of the worst things that led by the rod knock.

How to Fix a Knocking Engine Rod?

It becomes impossible for the engine rod to strike hard enough when the bearings are displaced or broken. Some repairing problems are not worthy of being resolved. But rod knocking is not one of them.

I can assure you that this knocking is never fixed by itself. You can use some part-time measures for fixing, but by doing that, you are just giving it time to worsen.

It is not safe to drive with a rod knock in the car engine. So you have to have a clear idea of how to fix the knocking coming from your engine rod.

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Temporary measures

At first, you can add some injector cleaner if you are sure that noises are created by the injector. The cleanser makes your engine get rid of the grim, makes noises go away.

You can move to apply a denser oil inside the engine. You can also add new additives for lesser noise, like polar additives, anti-wear additives, extreme pressure additives, etcetera. I am mentioning some efficient oil additives here. You can find them in any industrial shop.

• Lucas Heavy Duty oil stabilizer
• Red Line break-line oil
• Sea Foam SF16
• BG MOA oil supplement
• Lucas Engine Oil Shop Leak
• Rev X Fix Oil Treatment
• Acholi AR9100

How do you use

Step 1: Find a machine’s ramp. Drive your vehicle over the ramp.

Step 2: Put an oil pan right under your vehicle’s oil pan. Then remove your pan. Now after removing the pan, check the rod bearing. If the rod bearing is loose, you will hear a rod knocking.

Step 3 : Now pour the additives into the engine. Apply oil and additives in a masterly way to get rid of these problems. Add the fuel-injection cleaner into your gas tank if you want.

Related Post: How to Fix Diesel Engine Knocking – Easy Method Explained In 2022.

Permanent Solution

There is only one perpetual suggestion that I can give you- Rebuild your engine. Here I am explaining the easiest method to do it. Be cautious when you read.

Step 1 : Identify the exact place where the problem occurred like the crankshaft, main bearing, faulty oil pumps.

Step 2: Decide what you will do. If your engine’s cylinder walls are hampered badly, make the engine again. The best is to remake your connective rod bearings. It is a bit costly but terminable.

To fix things again, you need-

New engine seals, new gaskets, rod bearings, bolts which are cylinder headed, new pistons, camshaft bearings, timing chains, new crankshaft etcetera.

Step 3: Pull the rods then replace the frail ones. Give a hand to the bearings now. Replace the bearing.

Step 4: Polish and turn the crank. Polishing makes the engine smooth. Now, place thicker bearings according to the new turning of the crank. You can apply oil to make it more lubricated.

Step 5: Keep your brain calm and set up the whole new thing masterly.

Approximate Budget

The study shows a normal engine rod replacement costs from 2500 to more. You may ultimately need a figure of 5000 to 6000 dollars for a whole new replacement.

Things you need to investigate

• Number of days the sound is happening
• How much damage done till now
• How much husky the noise is!
• If your engine is extricable or not
• Whether your engine is high performance or not
• If your vehicle has got a carburetor, do not use a cleanser. Get a carburetor cleanser instead.

Fixing a Rod Knock – Engine Disassembly and Tear Down

Final Words

If your vehicle and you are facing these troubles, I am sure you will get a direction from this article on how to fix a knocking engine rod. Why wait for a mechanic when you can take some steps by yourself. Follow the instructions above. Stabilize or replace your engine rods before crashing completely.