Hi all. I have a 2004 Ranger and for about the past 7-9 months the exhaust has had a gurgling noise coming from it. Especially if i'm going up hill or the motor is just about to down shift. I almost sounds like metal flakes in a vaccuum. And most recently it is starting to idle rough, fluctuating (needle jumpy)between 500rpms to 900 rpms. It isn't at the point of staling yet but i'm sure it will start.

Not sure if this is a related problem but at times (at least once a day) my truck will hesitate/clunck when i am cruising down the road, i notice it happens the most at a speed greater than 45 mph. It is almost like i hit and invisible bump on the road while a gust of wind slows the truck down. I never get a chance to look at the rpms when it happens cause it's happens so fast. Does anyone have any input/idea what going on?!? please help...thanks!

Mileage: 40,000

 

There's several things that can cause your problem. I have acoupleideas as to what's wrong, but don't want to jump to conclusions, so I'dfirst run the ECU diagnostics just to see if the computer throws any error codes. If you can drive your vehicle to AutoZone, they'llcheck the codes for free. Please let us know the results, regardless of whether it gives an error code, so we can help you further.