Running Rich, Knocking, No CEL's! Help Please!
 

I was driving friday night, Noticed a bit of a shake, and got out, removed the negative and pumped the brakes to quick-reset the ECU.

About an hour later i'm driving along and the engine starts to lose all power over 1500 rpms. I get out while its still running and hear a knocking. It sounds as though its coming from the exhaust area.

Needed info; I have Kinetix High flow cats, and they are installed with only two bolts to the manifold on each side, I'm wondering if the lack of back pressure could have fried the valves in the engine or if not the valves, maybe the knock sensor.

Is it possible that the knock sensor could be the only culprit to this? Im theorizing here, but if the engine is naturally running rich ( its very hot here in sunny AZ) and the sensor is faulty, would it allow the engine to run rich and cause knock?

The most perplexing part is the lack of ANY CEL lights... I did have the engine codes read with an OBD 2 reader and the only thing showing up was that my clock spring was messed up, nothing about the engine directly.

If I can figure out how to load the video from my I phone, I will.

I'm worrying like crazy here because classes start here in a couple of weeks and I have no other form of transportation, I need to get this fixed in the next 16 days or I'm going to be in a serious pickle. On top of that, I cant afford to have a shop do the work.

Now a bit of back story info about me just to keep the negativity down: I was a certified mechanic back in 2002, I no longer work on cars for a living nor do I spend much time on them other than my own and close friends. I do understand how the internals work and I have done a ton of research trying to figure out what is going on. I've narrowed it down to either a bad knock sensor or I fried my valves due to the open-ish exhaust.

Any help would bring good kharma, and a life long friend.

Thanks, Cameron

why didnt you put the 3rd bolt on the cats?

It could be cam sensors starting to fail, could also be a injector issue, or a coil pack starting to go.

what year is your car...how many miles?

when was the last time you changed the oil - and is it consuming any at all?

The frame is an 03, the engine, not sure, 27k on the engine, it doesn't burn oil that I'm aware of (never low on oil changes) the third bolt is welded on the manifold and had to be cut out to remove the test pipes that where originally on it.

This car was bought from a forum member with so many issues, I've been trying to get it to a point where I could consider it reliable.
When it first started knocking I checked the oil level and it was very very low, smoke coming from the valve cover etc. Filled it up and haven't lost any as of yet but I haven't driven it since. I thought it could be possible due to the open exhaust that the oil could get burnt by lack of back pressure. Is that plausible?

I'm taking it in to a friends shop for a full diagnostic today.

Cam sensor is very possible, I did find in my research that it could be an issue. I'm just hoping I didn't fry the valves...

if you were knocking at any point due to low oil - that could potentially be your problem. internals could have issues.

yea. if it was really low on oil, theres a chance you have a bad crank bearing somewhere.....no oil in the oil pan= no lube for the bearings.... people who never check their oil really get on my nerves. it takes like 30 seconds to do and its free... cheapest insurance for your engine there is.. some people are just lazy. id jack the car up and take off the oil pan and have a look inside. see if any of the bearing look crooked or have excessive scratches on them