I have a GMC terrain 2017 with over 270,000 miles. Hardly any problems with this car. Lately is been making slight clicking noises after driving over 4 to 5 thousand miles and when I changed the oil they put a small bottle of gas treatment in the tank and the clicking noise went away. Then again after certain miles close to have the oil change again started with the clicking noise so I repeated the process with the gas treatment and clicking went away. My question is will it be a good idea to put premium gas to the car? Will better gas will keep the clicking away until I take it to my mechanic?
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Everyday AutoZone and O’Reilly’s have the fuel system treatment stuff on sale up at the register. Whether it helps anything is debatable, but it definitely will not hurt anything and it only costs a few dollars. With that many miles run it with every tank of gas and see what happens.
Do you have the 2.4 4-cylinder ecotec motor?
There’s problems with the timing chains and they’ll start to Make some noise every now and then as the tensioner wears out
Also, there’s a PCV hole that has to be cleaned out on the intake otherwise it can blow the rear main seal on the same motor
The 2.4 is a mess. Mine is now burning oil and chain rattle at 84k. Any day now I’m pulling it down and doing a timing, piston ring job. GM did a factory repair. It blew a rod out the block a week later and they put in a supposed low mile junk yard motor that is now in need of a rebuild and gave me a check to do it myself after about a month of fighting with them.
The oil consumption could be that plugged PCV hole, causes lots oil oil to be burned
Unless your manual calls for it, you are just wasting money. If you’re concerned about carbon buildup the best thing to use is a fuel treatment designed to help break that stuff down. In the old days you could use brake fluid in the intake manifold but it would likely ruin the electronics of the newer cars lol.
Use Top Tier Gas for the additives.
I use premium for mine because it now has carbon buildup and will ping with regular. Premium also retards timing in an engine. For my vehicle it keeps my check engine light off. Started using premium since 120k miles and never went back once i noticed it would stop pinging.
Premium does not retard timing. It allows the ecm to advance timing. Yours did not stop pinging due to timing retard. It stopped pinging because low octane fuel was not detonating.
Premium doesn’t retard timing.
Newer vehicles have higher compression ratios than older vehicles. The knock sensor keeps advancing timing until it recognizes knock and retards timing again. Newer vehicles can benefit in HP and MPG gains from premium fuel. The premium will not have ethanol in either which is a good thing. My 2015 Silverado does better on mid grade and even better on premium. Only time I run better grade is when I tow and it does make more power and my OBD scanner confirms the timing stays advanced more thus more power and MPG.
he premium will not have ethanol in either which is a good thing.
Yeah, I wouldn’t count on this. Unless you’re at a rare gas station that has ethanol-free gas, the premium still has ethanol in it everywhere I’ve seen. If you do find one that has ethanol-free fuel, it’s usually $1.00-1.50 more/gallon than competing stations with E10.
Run premium if you’re having issues with engine pinging. If not then stick to regular.
Hey, just figured I’d put it out there, the clicking noise your probably hearing is either the fuel injectors or the high pressure fuel pump on the engine. It usually has a foam piece around it because it is noisy and makes a clicking noise. Parts may just be worn a bit that’s causing the noise, but with as many miles as you have on yours it may not be a bad idea to have them replaced. And I’m glad to hear it’s going strong, they usually don’t live that long. But as long as you don’t do long oil change intervals you’ll be in good shape.
Premium gas isn’t better gas. That’s just a marketing scheme. It’s all about octane. The higher the octane the more resistant to ignition it is. Higher octane is required for engines with higher compression. It’s not better in anyway, I can be worse actually in a low compression engine because it won’t burn completely.
If you’ve got the motor with a turbo, you have to use higher octane gas. We used to have a 2018 GMC Terrain that had the 2.0 turbo and it required at least 91 octane.
But no one has actually said whether premium gas is actually a better gas. /s
Better in what regard? It’s better at preventing detonation. If you want additional cleaning additives, use TOP TIER GAS.
I’m going out and buying premium gas just bc y’all fuckers are so annoying saying the exact same thing over and over. Most of y’all never even came close to addressing the question either. Might throw in some avgas too.
There is no advantage to using higher octane fuel unless the engine knocks. Others will disagree. bobistheoilguy.com
Engines have knock sensors to keep them from knocking. If your engine timing is being retarded due to low octane fuel it will definitely benefit from higher octane fuel.
You are correct. In fact, GM’s v6 engines (at least) even have separate high octane and low octane spark advance tables, and the ECU switches between them based on the feedback from the knock sensor. However, the difference between high and low octane fuel has never been significant enough for my butt dyno to detect. The only reason I occasionally put a tank of premium through my LGX is because premium has higher detergent concentrations than regular.
Use TOP TIER GAS for the additional additives.
use whatever the manual / engine spec says and nothing else
Premium gas will only help to empty your wallet faster. It will have zero effect on your car.