rattle/noise from cam gear cover?

[mclerc]

my 91 awd tsi emits a fairly loud rattle/noise when it gets around 2500-3000 and never seems to go away until i drop the r's (it stays contant all the way to 5000, above there i'm not sure haven't taken the car that fast)

the noise is loud enough to where you can't hear anything BUT that inside the car (windows up), no spool, no bov, nothing.

I'm starting to wonder if its the plastic shielding over the cam gears. I removed the upper shield last night, ran the car and had a friend hold it at 2500-3000 while i listened... the noise was coming from that area, but taking the top shield off didn't help.

While that part was removed, i did notice one thing odd. on the cam gear closest to the front of the car, the lower shield around it had virtually NO space between it and the side of the gear (on the engine side) i couldn't tell if it was actually rubbing or not, but it doesn't seem that it would be good with it being that close. i'll try to take a pic tonight.

any ideas?
thanks

 

[L2RTSiAWD]

Moved to Problem Diagnosis.

 

[BUCK]

Still got your Balance Shafts?

 

[mclerc]

even tho i'm not sure what/where the balance shaft is (which will be my next search...), i don't think thats it. the car didn't make the noise before the mechanic replaced the head gasket for me so i'm thinking its something loose hiding somewhere. its been suggested maybe the cat converter could be it, and it does seem to be coming from that area. its hard to pin point... needs new exhaust anyway *shrug*

EDIT: after searching, now i'm not so sure... because that is on the same side i'm thinking the noise is coming from, and the car does vibrate a *little* while idle (enough for you to see the steering wheel vibrate). but i still don't know what those balance shafts are or what they do yet, still reading....

 

[BUCK]

Well when you delete the Balance Shafts (like I have) you pick up a Vibration in the Steering Wheel at idle that is NOT THERE when you have properly timed Balance Shafts - SOOOOOOOO.... It's possible the "mechanic" mis-timed a Balance Shaft when he installed the Timing Belt after your Head work.

 

[mclerc]

after i posted that i took a drive... when the car gets to normal temp the vibrations seem normal... its not visible by watching the steering wheel. guess i was paying attention to it when it was cold.

still rattles tho. is it easy to get those sync'd up myself? i wish i could describe what it sounds like, its really odd, but its loud enough to drown out the turbo

 

[mark95turbo]

Did he replace the timing belt tensioner? Sometimes if that goes out it will cause the belt to make a noise that sounds almost like valvetrain noises. If you take the top timing belt cover off and pull the 10MM bolt that is right between the cam gears out of the bottom cover you should be able to pull the bottom cover oout a bit and slip your hand in there. Reach down and pull up on the belt below the exhaust cam. If you can pull it up quite a bit it would be worth checking into the t-belt tensioner. Good luck!

 

[rxcutioner7]

My 90 GST is doing the same exact thing. I had my heads replaced and me and a friend were trying to install my air/fuel ratio gauge....well i spliced into a wire and told him to rev it up to about 4k and i heard a little pop noise and all of the sudden the car was making an odd rattling noise.....well ii let it idle while i jacked the car up.....it sounded like something was rattling in my downpipe, but im not for sure yet. I drove the car it seemed to run excellent still, but when i stopped, it would stumble at idle and the noise would come back. I then drove it around my neighborhood the next day, it ran fine with the exception of stumble at stops, then it started dying at me on stops and acted like it didnt want to crank back up. So i rushed it home and today im gonna have my dad look at it. Hell tell me right off hand what it is....he's been building race cars from the ground up for 20 years so he can just listen and tell me the prob and ill let ya know what we find out.