Engine Noise / Ticking, Knocking, Tapping MERGED

[eric489]

All threads with vague titles regarding engine bay noises are now merged HERE.

If you honestly feel we can diagnose an internal engine problem from a poor description or low-quality video / audio sample, give it a shot.


I own a 1997 gst spyder and there is a ticking noise comming fron the engine. It comes and goes and it mostly sounds bad at idle. I have 97,000 miles on it and i change the oil regularly. I changed it about 2000 miles ago I need help to fix the problem.

 

[pullstart82]

scenario

99gst spyder
just dropped a new motor in (7 bolt) from japan not that it should matter
first crank everything went fine
seccond crank everything fine still
3rd crank honda kid had the gas pedal and reved it out to roughly 65 after about 3-5 secconds of idling . . .
4th crank clunk clunk clunk

Question

what are the possibilities of damage from reving a new motor out like that it sounds almost as if one of the piston is lose banging around inside the block or smacking a valve ull get a video tomorrow for better help but any suggestions are more than appriciated thanks for your time guys

 

[95 'clipse RS]

and i there is no smole coming out so i think the rings set good im at 400 miles so idk what could be wrong i mean it pulls nicely untill 4000 since thats the highest i go too.

i hope they're set, you may think they set right but they still can be not set and not smoke, for a while. if you didnt get em set right you'll start smoking as early as 40k, unless they didnt seat hardly at all and you'll see it sooner. if you got em set right, you'll have an engine up to 150k no problem.

but honestly im not gettin into this "proper engine break-in procedure" because everyone and their brother's sister's hairdresser's mom's mechanic's girlfriend's cousin's husband has an opinion on how to do this whole procedure. all i know is many, many, shops and manuals tell me to seat the rings this way.

 

[steebm]

its sounds like a lifter tick or injector tick could be piston slap but id say not calm down and take it slow unplug the injuetors one at a time with it running an see if it stops also make sure all the lifters were replaced and just cause there new dont mean u ddidnt get a bad one

 

[snowborder714]

Have you taken the lifters out, properly bled them, and put them back in?

 

[DSMer541]

doesnt sound good, might have threw a bearing out, iv gone threw 2 engines that did that, one destroyed my crank, dont run it, pull the oil pan off ,you will probly find some shavings if its bearings.

 

[GSXWhite]

Have you taken the lifters out, properly bled them, and put them back in?

yes i did. i even did it twice. so i have no clue. and all lifters are brand new from extreme psi

 

[GSXWhite]

its sounds like a lifter tick or injector tick could be piston slap but id say not calm down and take it slow unplug the injuetors one at a time with it running an see if it stops also make sure all the lifters were replaced and just cause there new dont mean u ddidnt get a bad one

its defenelty lifter tick cause when i bleed them the second time the noise is a little diff now

 

[pullstart82]

so im glad i didn't run it today then
ill try and get some pictures of everything after i drop the oil pan
thanks

 

[cudadrt]

Well I've done the search and not sure if I might have found my problem. I've always been into V-8's and never encountered this problem so maybe it's just the 4 cylinder. I recently got crankwalk on my 7 bolt with only 120k miles so I had a stock 6 bolt I had occured sitting here. I decided to freshen it up before installing it in place of the 7-bolt. I decided to strenghthen everything up by using ARP head and main studs and ARP rod bolts. After installing the new rings and bearings and torqueing them to ARP's spec, I installed the engine and all seemed to be going well. I got everything hooked up and oil pump primed and timing belt done and decided it was time for the moment of truth. So I started it up and it started up great and was running smooth but has a low engine knock noise. I tried pulling spark plugs to see if I could possibly isolate it to maybe a bad rod bearing but the noise didn't change with any of the plug wires being removed. I searched here and it said that when using studs that it will have a change in the bearing clearance if not having it align honed for the studs. I've never had this problem on a V-8 and was wondering if this is true? Could I just remove the studs and put the main bolts back in with new bearings and possibly fix the knocking noise? As stated above, I assume it has something to do with the crank since I didn't get any fluctuation in noise by removing the plug wires. The only mods done to the bottom end are BS removed and ARP rod bolts and ARP main studs. The rest of my mods are in my profile. The motor runs better and smoother than my 7 bolt ever did so I',m hoping to be an easy fix. Thanks in advance for all who reply.

 

[jetdog]

ok my car has a act stage 3 clutch and i now have a rattle coming out of the trans. when the car is going down the road no matter what gear at 2000rpm i can feel the rattle threw the car but after about 3000rpm it goes away. when you sit still and rav it up it sounds as if something is going to come out of it and does not matter if clutch is in or out the sound does not cange so i dont think it is the trowout barring. dont know the age of the clutch but is at least 2 years old. and i try to see if i can get it to slip and it pulls fine no slip. i do have to hold it on the floor to get it in gear and i mean on the floor hard.

 

[brassc2007]

have you tried adjusting your clutch if it will hardly go into gear with it all the way depressed it could cause an issue i would try adjusting your clutch

 

[jetdog]

i did not know you could and how

 

[BogusSVO]

Speaking in general terms.. Moving to main studs from main bolts can make the main bearing housing bore distort.
align hone or bore may be needed, but should be atleast checked
The hosing bore specs are 2.4016-2.4024
some times a slight reaming of the main cap bolt holes are needed to give proper clearance for studs

I do not know if going back to the main bolts will relive the distorton of the cap, the cap may have already taken a "set"

 

[cudadrt]

Thanks for the input. I'm going to rebuild my 7 bolt and switch them back out. Then I'll go back through the 6 bolt and get it ready in case the 7 bolt fails again. After tearing the 7 bolt apart everything actually looked good except the rod bearings which showed signs of needing replaced due to it just started knocking when I started it and shut it right down. I'll have the 6 bolt align bored and try putting it back together as a spare. Just didn't realize that swapping in a set of studs would be such a problem as I've never came across this issue with a V-8.

 

[BogusSVO]

well the main caps are much stouter than that of the 4G63, and have a diffrent metalurgy (sp?) But I have had that problem with a SBC LT1 block before.

Be carful with the 7bolt block, from what I have learned they are bad about crank walk due to only have half a thurst washer, so do some research into how to correct thet problem, I have "heard" of a machine shop up in the midwest that re-machines the thurst in to a full round to solve the problem.
If your a stick car, I hear that the 7 bolts suffer from crank walk fairly quick.
I am sure you can find all the relivent info you need on your build hear.
I do not deal with the short blocks often enough to be a solid sorce of info. I mainly just deal with heads.

 

[jetdog]

pulled clutch out and found hair line cracks on the disc where the springs are wich will sould like hell being that all of them where craked on all four sides

 

[GSXWhite]

OK so i figured out why it kept on ticking. The reason is becuase when i put on the 2g head on my 6 bolt i didnt make the head bolts hole bigger which mean not enough oil was getting into the head and by that i mean to the lifters.
Just writing so incase some one else has this problem.
So thanks guys for all the help

 

[JayB12]

I went to look at a very clean 98 talon tsi awd today. When we started it, it was making this odd noise which I thought was a rod bearing. I'm not positive. I'm 17 and I really have my heart set on this car. It's pretty cheap, only 2k, I found a vid on youtube that shows the exact same thing that happened to the one I looked at. It won't smoke until Higher Rpms also. And if it matters its Automatic.

Heres the one thats similar - YouTube - Problem on my eclipse

 

[GSXWhite]

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What do you guys think?

 

[95GreenGSX]

Yup, thats rod knock.

 

[StarTurboEclips]

I hear lifter tap. A rod knocking is usually louder and lower pitched.

 

[Boot92]

+1 star.

It sounds like REALLY bad Valve Tap, your valve stem seals are going bad.

they are very easy to replace as long as you have a 4G63 Valve Spring compressor.
but I would suggest replacing them RIGHT AWAY, other wise your gonna have to get new valves.
unless of course you want to use this as an excuse to get aftermarket Valves.


but beware of other internal engine damage (mainly to the head)

 

[95GreenGSX]

Thats what I thought at first, but when they were just replaced with 3g valves? What else could it be but rod?

 

[Boot92]

just doesn't sound like Rod knock.

especially since like star said, its usually lower pitched and louder then that.

but also its usually not that fast at idle. unless his idle is at like 2k

there could be a problem with the valve replacement, it could be a mistake or maybe the stem seals werent pushed down all the way. its happened.

 

[GSXWhite]

+1 star.

It sounds like REALLY bad Valve Tap, your valve stem seals are going bad.

they are very easy to replace as long as you have a 4G63 Valve Spring compressor.
but I would suggest replacing them RIGHT AWAY, other wise your gonna have to get new valves.
unless of course you want to use this as an excuse to get aftermarket Valves.


but beware of other internal engine damage (mainly to the head)

well the valve seals were all replaced when I had the head at a machince shop for resurfacing. and the noise just got this bad before it was more of a tick. but im dropping the oil pan tommrow to find out for sure.

Oh and when we put a stethescope to it the sound is coming from everywhere kind of louder at the buttom end!