I'm trying to troubleshoot an issue with my car. Whenever I give the car gas I hear a ticking/flapping noise that gets faster when I accelerate faster. The noise is only there when I give the car gas. I've been doing a little reading online and I've come across a few sites that say it may be a bad exhaust manifold gasket. I did take the car to a muffler place a few months back to check for an exhaust leak but he didn't think there was one. Anyone else had this problem?

 

Can you give me the sites that say it could be a bad exhaust manifold gasket? I'm thinking it could just be a bad exhaust gasket. Not the manifold gasket. Did the muffler place inspect around all bolts and see if the exhaust pipe gaskets were okay?

 

I just googled the symptoms and read through the hits that came up. There were a bunch of different car sites (not all mitsubishi). When I took the car to the exhaust shop, all he did was put a stethoscope to it and listen. He said he couldn't hear any leaks.

 

anybody experienced anything similar?

 

I am experiencing the same thing right now. I just installed the RRM header, and and a new exhaust gasket. When I give it gas or am cruising at say like 35-45 with just enough pressure on the gas I hear this ticking/ tinking noise every 5 seconds or so at the front of the engine. I had my exhaust guy check the welds on my exhaust system and he let me listen too and there werent any leaks. It sounded more towards the front of the engine. I am going to check the header gasket and I am also going to check where the header mounts to the downpipe, from there on everything of mine is welded and there are no leaks at the welds. I cant tell that its hurting anything ,just really annoying

 

I checked the manifold gasket and as far as I can tell no leak. I think its the gasket between the header and downpipe, which I am going to replace and see if it fixes the noise. It is a ping/tink noise every 5 to 10 seconds while I am giving it gas, not flooring it, but just normal driving...weird

 

That's exactly what I hear. When I give it a good amount of gas I don't hear it but when I'm accelerating normally, I can head it constantly. It sounds like a card going through the spokes of a bike when you're a kid. I might take it to the dealership to let them have a listen. My brother had something similar on his civic a few yrs back and it turned out to be a cracked header. Let me know if the noise goes away once you change the gasket. Thanks.

 

If your flanges are strait, dont run any gaskets. Just run one between the head and manifold and no where else down the exhaust. They will blow and cause issues.

 

The manifold moves as the engine gets torqued up on the mounts. It may look like it seals just hanging there, but when you're driving with no gasket or a poor quality one between your pipe flanges you're gonna get some leakage.