benwahballs

Ok, redoing the head gaskets on my 89 3.0l pu, taking me forever.... its been a few monthes in the process, and now I've forgotten where the hell the knock sensor wire hooks up. My old one is in pretty rough shape, and it looks like it may have been cut at the wire? It goes from a clip to just the end of the wire (about 5 inches). Don't even see where it clips into.. When I took my intake manifold off originally I had quite a rat's nest (literally, a mouses nest) in there, and I've got their tooth marks in just about anything plastic, maybe they chewed threw it??? i dunno, any description of the knock sensor wire's connections would be a great help to me, FSM gives me the ol "Connect knock sensor wire".

benwahballs

Also just saw on a 4x4wire thread that "everyone has problems with their knock sensor after head gaskets replacements" on the 3.0 any truth to this? good idea to replace?

toyota_mdt_tech

Yes, exact reason we installed a new sensor and pigtail wire on all our headgasket recalls. Its usually just corrosion if you want to clean it, but its a long ways in.

benwahballs

Thanks for info. knock sensor is located on tob of block, in between heads, in middle just under air intake manifold, correct? And Knock sensor wire has clip on in that clips to knock sensor? well where does other end of this wire go?

BC Rider

well where does other end of this wire go?


Just under the the throttle body you will find a connector to the main harness for the knock sensor. I believe that if you look closely, you will actually find a notch for the ks wire just under the intake manifold. Your main wire connector should be right there - the ks wire only sticks about 3 inches past that notch.

benwahballs

Ok, I get it now ("You'll have to excuse my friend, he's a little slow... The town is back THAT WAY".. nm). Just didn't understand how it all hooked up. that "clip" on wire i was referring to earlier actually clips on to wire harness (where u are talking about, bc rider, thanks btw), and at other end of ks wire is bare wire that is inserted into sensor. needless to say, i went ahead and ordered both sensor and wire from good ol courtney toyota. 240cad for the sensor and 16 for the wire connector. Surprisingly, oem was cheapest i could find. napa wanted over 450!!!

THANK YOU BOTH FOR POSTS, greatly appreciated!!!
BTW, does anyone (cough cough MDT TECH cough cough) know how to remove said sensor? Does it thread out? special socket?

toyota_mdt_tech

The pigtail goes under the intake manifold via a slot in the head. Goes on the drivers side and the connector for the pigtail is right between injector connectors #4 and #6

toyota_mdt_tech

Hey, better take care of that cought! Yeah, it just screws into a blind hole. Not sure what size socket will fit it. Its a hex and around a 26 or 28 mm area. As for the dealer being cheaper. I see that quite often. Many people dont even price dealer stuff. There is a myth they are always more expensive.

benwahballs

Just thought I'd add, a 1 1/16" socket fit on there, did the job. And thanks again yota tech and bc rider for final location of wire, turns out my old ks wire had been hacked in half (which is why above I thought the wire had a "bare end" to it"). Don't know how long it was like that, I imagine quite some time, although I never had a check engine light on.