How come the muffler shop never found that ?

Fix your exhaust -

You should have mentioned this before now, it may be the answer and maybe why it did not make the noise when putting a load on it in gear and stationary. Re check the torque settings on the cv axles, btw what torque setting did your mechanic use ? Were they tightened up with a flat washer to torque and then the correct washer installed and re torqued ? If not they may need re torquing.

remove the magnetic oil drain plug and see if there are tiny or chunks of broken metal attached to it, that way you'll know that something got wacked inside... just a thought.... hopefully your oil drain plug is magnetic..if not, then forget it.

btw,no need to drain the oil totally, unscrew the drain plug slowwwwwly then gently tap your finger to the hole while inspecting the drain plug. some oil will spill for sure but depends on how quick you are...good luck!

 

 

 

 

 

common sense vs. Mr. Haynes----> who wins???

Well... I have resolved to set the car on fire in a barren field...

Smoke tested the car... I have a wicked leak in my muffler... but no where else on the system.

I put on a spare (working) throttle body with different injector and fuel regulator... no difference.

I took the intake off to look for anything suspect underneath it... nada.

I took the dash off and the sound is still coming from roughly from the fire wall.

Put the car up on the hoist... removed every loose bolt that no longer had a home or a thing to bolt to (mainly my old skid plate bolts)

Shook, rattle and rolled everything.

Considering this started immediately AFTER I had my cv joints repacked.... perhaps its the clicking, crappy outer joint thats causing me such grief. My mechanic says it couldn't be...

There must be someone in Victoria or BC with an SPi that would have an injector to swap in.

That would eliminate it as a cause. I am not sure you would hear the injector at speed on the road even when it ids clicking loudly.

Terry

Well that video throws a whole different light on the subject but at least you fixed the stabilizer bracket.

I would remove the air cleaner assembly or just remove the top and run the car with a long screwdriver or a mechanics stethescope next to your ear with the screwdriver placed on the fuel injector and see if the noise is amplified or matches what you are hearing. Also to check for an internal engine noise run the car down the road with each plug wire disconnected one at a time to see if anything changes, it will run ok on three cylinders for short periods and may isolate the noise to one particular cylinder if it is internal.

BTW Boisons/Robsters advice is better ignored based on his previous ramblings a while back.

Hey everyone... I appreciate all the suggestions and I will try and answer them as detailed as I can.

Boison- Thank you... I literally have taken everything apart on the top end and have repeatedly shaken everything. There is nothing in this engine bay at the moment that isn't snugged down. Stablizers are solid... nothing is vibrating against anything.

Water pump was replaced and is no longer hitting the fan shroud.

The fuel injector (SPI) is part of the throttle body/intake housing and I can't take it out... but I am told that the injector is normally loud and typical of its function.

The valve clearance was double checked by myself and a mechanic. Everything is within spec.

I checked the compression 180/190/180/180.

I am going to take the whole top end off again and remove the manifolds... my last guess (although told by the muffler shop that it was fine) is the connection between manifold and downpipe....

It is very VERY weird that the sound only comes on between 2500-3500 rpm when I am accelerating... ARGGGG

I threw fuel injector cleaner and ran premium fuel at a bleak hope this was due to crap gas or something.

 

I had an alternator go bad but yeah it was continuous. I had a fan belt once be intermittent though. But it was pretty obvious sounding to me. It's too hard to get a good sound from the videos for me.

both fan belt and shot bearing will produce a continuous high pitch tenor sound, his is pretty much intermittent, but yes still a possibility. 

hang in there austin84(lad), we promise , we will shoot that bird hiding inside your engine bay.( maybe nesting already) if Mr Haynes gave up on you... i won't.

 

btw, do you still have your Westfalia van?

You probably have a bird. I've been watching this waiting for an answer, my guess was fan belt or alternator bearings. Maybe muffler bearings.

"...these are the practical approach to your problem which you can't find in the $33 haynes manual . if one asks a question and someone replies and point you to Haynes manual, it only meant one thing... he doesn't know the answer..."

Or, it could mean you haven't bothered to look up an answer that's easily accessable from the HBOL. [rolleyes]

lol, obviously and as always Lanky didn't get the point. not surprise lol, the point is you dont shake the throttle body assembly as a whole you need to shake it part it by part to catch the culprit. gosh!, that's what you become when you put Haynes in the center of your life, don't let Haynes run your life lank, think  beyond (pronounced as bey-ond) Haynes theories.

don't disturb me, im trying to help Austin84 here.. lol just teasin' yah

 

 

could be, but his suggestion of shaking both the carburetor and the fuel injectors is non-sensical. Maybe he meant throttle body.

either that, or maybe he is thinking of a robstermobile

For those with more experience diagnosing engine internals, might it be a bent rod or piston slap or something? The last video sounds a little to me like when I "over-exerted" my first 850, experienced valve lift and was left with a mild knock (like that) which got heavier under load. Boison's suggestion about valve adjustment may not be far off.

this topic has gotten 2pages of replies but still no solution. 

mate, pls do this,  with the engine off, jiggle all the parts where you suspect the noise is comming, start with the air filter housing, shake it with your hands, then remove the air filter housing to expose the carburetor, shake the carb, carb throttle etc basically everithing in that area, brake fluid reservoir etc. ALL!!  then turn engine on while the air filter housing is out, observe, if you still hear the stupid noise hold each part you see inside the engine bay if the noise stops then tighten  the bolts or screw thats holding it. 

still no luck? get a stethoscope ang hear the inside of the valve cover, sounds like a ticking sound created by the valves set too wide. when did you last do your valve adjustments? 

still no luck? now if you suspect its the fuel injector,  remove one injector at a time, get a bottle where you can contain the gas that will come out of the injector, fire up the engine, ( yes, the engine will run with 3 cylinder) while observing for the flow of gas out of the injector , hear if its creating the noise while holding the injector. you should see gas squirting out of the injector. do this procedure in all four injectors, if one is creating sound differently then replace it. 

again while you're holding the injector in your hand with the engine off, try to shake it vigorously and observe clanking ang tuking, there might be loose spring or anything inside. 

these are the practical approach to your problem which you can't find in the $33 haynes manual . if one asks a question and someone replies and point you to Haynes manual, it only meant one thing... he doesn't know the answer... i know someone who does that a lot. aaaanyway.. lol 

do this procedure and report back to us.

 

ps: make sure that there's no fire around while doing this procedure . safety first.

https://youtu.be/Hpgv069dBx0

Latest Update!

Everything from my previous posts remains the same. To add to the list, I had the muffler shop take a look at the car. Took three of them (invidiually) out and around. They heard what I heard and described it less as an exhaust leak from the exhaust portion of the system... but sounded like it came from above. They confirmed that there were no holes in the exhaust and everything was functioning properly.

I took the whole damn thing apart again today and cleaned everything bit... while I was there, I took the wishbone/stablizer out and noticed that the lower half connected to the firewal (and the clutch fluid pipe) had worked itself free from its spot weld. I grabbed a piece of aluminum, bent it into place and drilled a hole in the firewall... whole thing is secure. Bushings are in tact and fine.

Fired her up... damn thing is still making the noise. I am starting to think the mechanic previous was right... in that the sound is coming from the filter housing as opposed to the actual exhaust area. Maybe the injector is clicking like crazy under load?

Here is a video of the car idling and the injector clicking quite loudly... :25 seconds... and 1:01

 

https://youtu.be/Hpgv069dBx0

 

It is an exhaust leak as suggested before. Try putting a load on the engine with it stationary and the handbrake on with the car in gear let the clutch out and give it some revs it should make the same noise, as suggested the engine is moving around proabably with bad mounts and opening up the leak.

As has been said, the motor flexes in its mounts when you apply power - the more power the more flex. All cars do this. High power muscle cars sometimes have chains in the event their motor mounts shear and the engine tries to flip itself over. In a Mini, the engine flexes forward and back and is restrained by the engine steady bars. But they still flex a little. The exhaust system does not flex much, so there is a hinging effect at the front. If your header or manifold are solid, then the exhaust flex is concentrated at the elbow where "down" turns to "back". (I once had an 850cc engine snap an exhaust pipe here.). By your desciption, you have a flex pipe or connection here. If it is a manufactured flex joint, it should be quiet unless leaking. If it is a piece of flex tubing grafted in, then it may be flexing, but exhaust pipe is dry and unlubricated and may be squeaking like a hinge. I don't know of a lube that would withstand the heat except maybe powdered graphite used for locks.

I cold not hear "chirps" from your last video - just exaggerated exhaust sound, like a hole in a muffler or something. An exhaust hole does not produce much sound unless the engine is strained - the load on the engine resists the pistons from moving with the power stroke, so when the exhaust valve does open, the escaping discharge makes considerably more noise. The "charge" to the cylinder is larger because the throttle is wide open. The burn may not be fully complete so one might be hearing the tail end of the explosion.