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Exaust rattle?


Ranger4x4.0

Well-Known Member
Joined
Aug 24, 2015
Messages
215
City
Poplar Bluff, Mo
Vehicle Year
1998
Engine
4.0 V6
Transmission
Manual
My credo
God is great, beer is good, and rangers are awesome!
My exaust rattles really bad sometimes, yes sometimes, it will go away for a month and it will come back, doesn't make sense. Im thinking its coming from the muffler, last time i checked it so i have no idea where its at. Fixes? Advice?
Tia
 
Most likely cause is that the "insides" of a Cat Converter or the Muffler has rusted out.
Pieces move around and rattle until they find a secure spot then stop rattling until they break loose again.

get a rubber mallet or short 2x4 and tap on these parts, you will often hear the rattling part when you do.

Exhaust systems rust from the inside out.
When you burn gasoline(H=hydrocarbon), with Oxygen(O) one of the normal by products is H2O(water), this is why you see vapor coming from tail pipes on cold days and why water drips from tail pipes on warm days.

This is the reason stainless steel is use in some expensive exhaust systems.

And just FYI, these rattling pieces can block exhaust fully or partially, when that happens MPG will go down and engine will lose power at higher RPMs.
This is why the old potato in the tail pipe trick causes engine trouble :)
 
Last edited:
Yep, check the heat shield rattle first before getting too excited, if I remember right many moons ago Ford actually put out a TSB that involved putting very large hose clamps around the catalytic converter...
 
thanks guys, ill look for a heat shield. i hope its not the converter, i don't know how expensive that would be!
 
Unfortunately, shield rattles don't tend to come and go, they can, just less likely to go once part of the shield has broken loose, more of a come and stay rattle, lol.
 
Well, it does kinda sound like a heat sheild rattle. idk, ill try to get a video of it and post the link here.
 
Don't need a vid, it is loose or not. If the rattle is not on the outside, it is inside.
 

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