[Tyc0]

Simple question, pulled my plugs this morning trying to see if my injectors are leaking and I'm really not sure. I asked five different people if they smell like fuel and all of them just said they smell like an engine (they are not car people). My sense of smell is terrible right now so I'm really not sure. Any experience from people who has smelled their plugs with leaky injectors would be great. The plugs were not wet btw.

[ab987]

Originally Posted by Tyc0

Simple question, pulled my plugs this morning trying to see if my injectors are leaking and I'm really not sure. I asked five different people if they smell like fuel and all of them just said they smell like an engine (they are not car people). My sense of smell is terrible right now so I'm really not sure. Any experience from people who has smelled their plugs with leaky injectors would be great. The plugs were not wet btw.

Mine were visibly wet after a few hours of not driving. Real test is to smell the oil

[Tyc0]

Originally Posted by ab987

Mine were visibly wet after a few hours of not driving. Real test is to smell the oil

Well they definitely were not wet after a night of sitting. I did this when I changed it and again I found it hard to tell, and apparently so do many others. There was recently a thread about this where many people said it was even normal to have a fuel smell in the oil.

[ab987]

Originally Posted by Tyc0

Well they definitely were not wet after a night of sitting. I did this when I changed it and again I found it hard to tell, and apparently so do many others. There was recently a thread about this where many people said it was even normal to have a fuel smell in the oil.

My oil after 5k changes smells absolutely nothing like fuel, if fuel content is high enough to smell it's probably too much. Mine reeked of fuel before I replaced my index 7s

[E93Beast]

Originally Posted by Tyc0

Simple question, pulled my plugs this morning trying to see if my injectors are leaking and I'm really not sure. I asked five different people if they smell like fuel and all of them just said they smell like an engine (they are not car people). My sense of smell is terrible right now so I'm really not sure. Any experience from people who has smelled their plugs with leaky injectors would be great. The plugs were not wet btw.

It would depend on how bad they are leaking, if leaking at all.
When they are completely fucked, you will know it and smell it.

[CarAbuser]

Originally Posted by Tyc0

Well they definitely were not wet after a night of sitting. I did this when I changed it and again I found it hard to tell, and apparently so do many others. There was recently a thread about this where many people said it was even normal to have a fuel smell in the oil.

Anyone claiming that it's normal is kidding themselves because they dont want to fix their car.

[studio54]

Originally Posted by CarAbuser

Anyone claiming that it's normal is kidding themselves because they dont want to fix their car.

Well, it's also normal to have some disinclination to replace all 6 injectors that are worth 1500$ to a car that is worth 3000$ more or less.....

[Tyc0]

Originally Posted by CarAbuser

Anyone claiming that it's normal is kidding themselves because they dont want to fix their car.

They claimed it was because of blow by or something like that, there were many people who said they experienced the same thing even with new injectors. But you certainly could be right.

[Tyc0]

Originally Posted by studio54

Well, it's also normal to have some disinclination to replace all 6 injectors that are worth 1500$ to a car that is worth 3000$ more or less.....

But we certainly don't mind spending the 3k for upgraded turbos, funny how that works . I would say 3k is a massive lowball…I don't know about you but that doesn't seem reasonable to me. The used car market is very good right now, though these cars do depreciate terribly.

[ab987]

Originally Posted by Tyc0

They claimed it was because of blow by or something like that, there were many people who said they experienced the same thing even with new injectors. But you certainly could be right.

There is absolutely going to be some fuel blowby, that's why if you've ever done a blackstone analysis it says something like less than 2% is acceptable, at 5k mine has always been <0.5%. But at that level you won't really smell it, just smells like plain old motor oil. If you have fuel dripping and not burning because the motor is off however... that percentage suddenly increases a lot. It is not normal to smell any fuel unless you are doing 20k interval changes and burn off a qt.

[ab987]

Originally Posted by studio54

Well, it's also normal to have some disinclination to replace all 6 injectors that are worth 1500$ to a car that is worth 3000$ more or less.....

I think you'd have to have a crazy rough car to be worth $3k... any driving N54 car is really worth upwards of $5k around where I'm at, and you are talking 180k auto cars at that point. Mine right now at 94k is still worth about $13k, so suddenly the $10k I've put into the car seems a bit smaller, but maybe I tell myself that to feel better.

[Tyc0]

Originally Posted by ab987

I think you'd have to have a crazy rough car to be worth $3k... any driving N54 car is really worth upwards of $5k around where I'm at, and you are talking 180k auto cars at that point. Mine right now at 94k is still worth about $13k, so suddenly the $10k I've put into the car seems a bit smaller, but maybe I tell myself that to feel better.

Completely agree…even with the amount of money I'm dumped into this thing. Still makes me smile every time I drive it, but I'd assume 500whp could do that in any vehicle.

[studio54]

Well just in case ppl here, didn't understand, I was just kidding to say that those injectors are incredibly expensive and i think it's normal to find out if they are working or not before replacing them, but it's just me

[ab987]

Originally Posted by studio54

Well just in case ppl here, didn't understand, I was just kidding to say that those injectors are incredibly expensive and i think it's normal to find out if they are working or not before replacing them, but it's just me

Absolutely, I don't think any of us here would just drop $1500 just because the injectors are old (I bought mine from the dealer for $3000 -_-). OP needs to check his plugs and/or oil if he really suspects they are leaking. Another test is to post a log of acceleration followed by off-throttle for a few seconds. Trims and AFR will likely tell us a story

[langsbr]

Originally Posted by studio54

Well just in case ppl here, didn't understand, I was just kidding to say that those injectors are incredibly expensive and i think it's normal to find out if they are working or not before replacing them, but it's just me

I have no shame in saying these injectors are expensive. 300 bucks a piece is not chump change no matter what anyone thinks, especially for something that is apt to go bad so often.

Call me cheap, I don't care - I don't replace parts until I know they are bad. My car with hybrids traps 130 in the 1/4 on E35, and that's running 3 Index 1s and 3 Index 8s. When an injector definitely goes bad, THEN I'll buy some. Why waste the money otherwise? It means more money for other mods.

[ab987]

Originally Posted by langsbr

I have no shame in saying these injectors are expensive. 300 bucks a piece is not chump change no matter what anyone thinks, especially for something that is apt to go bad so often.

Call me cheap, I don't care - I don't replace parts until I know they are bad. My car with hybrids traps 130 in the 1/4 on E35, and that's running 3 Index 1s and 3 Index 8s. When an injector definitely goes bad, THEN I'll buy some. Why waste the money otherwise? It means more money for other mods.

I generally have this attitude, but with this platform it's tough. You could wait until your belt is shredded and maybe wrapped around your timing chain, or until fuel dilation from leaky injectors causes you to spin a bearing... you know what I mean? I wouldn't mess around with an injector that I know could be leaking, as soon as I found out 3 of mine were obviously leaking I decided it was time for all 6. Not cheap to do, but to find an engine in the condition mine is in would cost much more.

[studio54]

Originally Posted by ab987

I generally have this attitude, but with this platform it's tough. You could wait until your belt is shredded and maybe wrapped around your timing chain, or until fuel dilation from leaky injectors causes you to spin a bearing... you know what I mean? I wouldn't mess around with an injector that I know could be leaking, as soon as I found out 3 of mine were obviously leaking I decided it was time for all 6. Not cheap to do, but to find an engine in the condition mine is in would cost much more.

Beside obvious symptoms like hard start and misfires, I hope the DME will trigger some fuel codes when an injector or more goes very bad.

That said, you are right, when an injector goes bad, it could create worst damages than a simple injectors replacement.

[CarAbuser]

No problem with people running their cars until they blow and then buying another cheap scrapper instead of doing maintenance.

My problem is with people saying things like fuel smelling oil being normal or the thread about turbo siren noise being normal. It might be normal for a beater bu it's not helpful to users who actually maintain their cars and might want to keep their car long-term.

[studio54]

Originally Posted by CarAbuser

No problem with people running their cars until they blow and then buying another cheap scrapper instead of doing maintenance.

My problem is with people saying things like fuel smelling oil being normal or the thread about turbo siren noise being normal. It might be normal for a beater bu it's not helpful to users who actually maintain their cars and might want to keep their car long-term.

Hehe i don't know about the fuel in oil thing, but concerning the siren noise, if you talk about the recent "faint whine" thread, i don't think the conclusion of the thread is saying that having a turbo a siren is normal.
It's more like it tends to be a normal (bad) result of running too high boost on stock turbos (like more than 18psi). And people are mostly scary about that.

It's also important to differentiate a siren compared to a faint whine, faint whine is barely audible. I just know that before i start to "abuse" them, brand new mitsu made the faint whine when running cold in winter, audible when windows closed and no music (and running catless downpipes).

Well that's another story, i dont want to hijack the thread sorry !

[ab987]

Originally Posted by studio54

Hehe i don't know about the fuel in oil thing, but concerning the siren noise, if you talk about the recent "faint whine" thread, i don't think the conclusion of the thread is saying that having a turbo a siren is normal.
It's more like it tends to be a normal (bad) result of running too high boost on stock turbos (like more than 18psi). And people are mostly scary about that.

It's also important to differentiate a siren compared to a faint whine, faint whine is barely audible. I just know that before i start to "abuse" them, brand new mitsu made the faint whine when running cold in winter, audible when windows closed and no music (and running catless downpipes).

Well that's another story, i dont want to hijack the thread sorry !

This exactly, my last 2 absolutely brand new sets did this after mere weeks. There's no obvious bearing wear and they boost normally, but definitely whine, especially when cold. Not quite a siren that shaft play would cause, just some center section noise. No bearing material detected in an oil analysis either.

Back to the topic, as stated above fuel smell in oil, especially at our 5k intervals, is NOT normal and means you should probably replace whatever injectors are leaking before it creates catastrophic issues.

[N54weezy]

Have you tried the paper towel injector out trick to confirm if any of them leaking ?

Replace injector seals at the same time.

[Tyc0]

Originally Posted by N54weezy

Have you tried the paper towel injector out trick to confirm if any of them leaking ?

Replace injector seals at the same time.

This is really smart, haven't seen it before. I might do this depending on what the off throttle logs say. I pulled my plugs again this morning after really getting the car hot last night and they are still dry.