if by leaky seal he counts piston rings as seals then yes its a leaky 'seal'.

as for the gurgling noise, where is it coming from'?

Yeah, I kind of figured it was the piston rings based on what I had read around here and other places, but seeing as how my specialty is computers and not cars, I thought I'd give him the benefit of the doubt. Any advice on the piston rings? From what I've seen, the best procedure is to soak them in diesel overnight, or something similar.

Regarding the location of the noise, that's difficult to ascertain. It only makes the noise while in gear, so I can't recreate it while revving in neutral. Also, I can only hear it with the windows up, A/C off, radio off, etc. So all I can say with any certainty is that it's coming from the front of the car, but that's kind of a lame / unhelpful description. I guess I was just mostly wondering if anyone had had a similar noise emanate from their car before and if so, what the cause was.

Yeah, I kind of figured it was the piston rings based on what I had read around here and other places, but seeing as how my specialty is computers and not cars, I thought I'd give him the benefit of the doubt. Any advice on the piston rings? From what I've seen, the best procedure is to soak them in diesel overnight, or something similar.

 

Regarding the location of the noise, that's difficult to ascertain. It only makes the noise while in gear, so I can't recreate it while revving in neutral. Also, I can only hear it with the windows up, A/C off, radio off, etc. So all I can say with any certainty is that it's coming from the front of the car, but that's kind of a lame / unhelpful description. I guess I was just mostly wondering if anyone had had a similar noise emanate from their car before and if so, what the cause was.

When I bought my 2000 in May and had it inspected, the mechanic diagnosed an oil leak at the O-ring. They had to order the part, and during the 2 week wait it consumed a lot of oil, especially on the highway (I was checking it constantly). During that 2 week span it consumed about 3 liters (I was topping up from a 4 liter bottle I kept in the trunk) in 1,500 km of driving. It also rattled at the front end during idle and at low speeds. Wound up having the belt tensioner replaced along with the O-ring. That cured the problem though (not to say this is what's causing your leak, but I'd check the O-ring to rule it out).

Over the last 2,000 km since my last oil change (done a couple weeks after the above repair), I topped up once with 4 ounces about 200 km ago. This is still "oil consumption" but its reasonable for a 10 year old car. I use dino rather than synthetic. I'd love to switch to synthetic for the extended OCI and other benefits, but since the car has (to my knowledge) only ever had dino in it, any risk of creating a leak (however small) isn't worth it to me. So this car will only ever see dino.

No idea about the gurgling noise you're hearing. Very odd.

-Spyder

isn't it coming from the timing chain? coz on my 2000 corolla, upon acceleration and the rpm reaches 3, i could hear the timing chain rattling... any insights?

Hi all,

 

I didn't see a topic like this posted before, so here goes:

I have a 2001 Corolla SE 4-cylinder automatic transmission that's behaving oddly. Upon acceleration there's a sort of gurgling noise that persists regardless the speed the car is moving at. However, the noise disappears after I ease my foot off the gas - I can accelerate very slowly and have the noise disappear, but the acceleration is hardly noticeable. For the most part I do just city driving, but occasionally go on long road trips with the car. Also, currently using Fram 10w-30 fully synthetic oil.

The car also has a huge problem with oil consumption: I just recently drove from Omaha to Portland (1,600 mi) and had to add a gallon of oil during the length of the trip. From what I hear the 2001 models are oil eaters, but this was still disconcerting. After consulting a mechanic he said it was most likely due to usage via a leaky seal. Could / is this tied to the noise I'm hearing? I'm willing to keep adding oil (but only for now since I hardly drive it anymore) since keeping the car topped off will keep it running fine, but the noise is very bothersome. Any ideas?

All help is much appreciated and let me know if more information is needed.

I am pretty sure that you are describing a exhaust leak problem coming from the exhaust manifold area...probably the donut gasket in front of the cat. converter. It's not a gurgling noise, but more of a raspy exhaust note is what I think you meant to say.