icarusfalling

Since the day I bought my 4 runner, almost 3 months ago, a loud ticking noise has been coming from the engine and it's driving me nuts. I removed my passenger side exhaust manifold which was bent about an inch out of shape and had it milled to fit properly again. That job was a huge PITA, but at least the exhaust leak is fixed. However, now that the "put put put" sound of the exhaust leak is gone, I can hear a much more pronounced, and even more annonying ticking sound from the engine bay that was muffled before by the exhaust leak. I thought the sound might be my lifters, so I changed my oil to Mobil 10w30 high mileage and added a quart of ATF, but the noise is still as loud as ever. My mechanic seems to think that the noise is a wristpin rattle (supposedly common on old V6's), or maladjusted valves. He seems to think that I will be wasting my time and money by having him adjust the valves though. So, what the hell should I do to get rid of the noise? Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

icarusfalling

Cmon guys, surely someone has had a similar problem...

rimpainter.com

Well, no offense, but if your mechanic doesnt know exactly what it is, how would we diagnose it over the net? Not flaming here, just being realistic. Also, if your manifold was bent "an inch out of shape" I garantee it wasnt milled to spec. Giving you the benefit of the doubt, and assuming you are exaggerating...

You named most of the causes of a ticking sound. More questions:

Is it a timed sound?

Does it get faster with more throttle?

Does it go away and come back?

Who milled the manifold?

Where is the sound coming from exactly?

Give us more info, and we might be able to help you better.

icarusfalling

Thanks for replying. Sorry if I was being vague. The noise Im hearing is a constant click click click sound that is especially noticable when the engine is idleing. At first I thought that the noise was coming from the top of the engine, but, the noise is still very pronounced it you remove the drivers side wheel and listen near the bottom of the engine as well.
The clicking speeds up as you rev the engine and is less noticible (but still annoying) in the higher rpm range. There is a sweet spot around 1500-2000 rpms where the sound is almost un-detectable. My mechanic milled the manifold perfectly as far as I can tell, because the exhaust leak sound is completely gone now. But, like I said earlier, getting rid of the exhaust leak noise only made the clicking sound from the engine much more pronounced. Does this sound like something that an oil additive (or switching to amsoil) would fix, or should I adjust the valves?

donc

I had an issue with the same type of noise and it went away when I switched to Amsoil. Check out Gaget's site and see if he didn't have the same thing happen.
Good Luck

FattyCBR

What year do you have? Neither the 1st, 2nd, or 3rd gen. has lifters, they use an overhead camshaft. It could however be your valve shims are out of spec if the noise is coming from your valve covers. Have you tried using a piece of rubber tubing on the valve covers and injectors to determine where exactly the click is coming from? A lot of people hear a clicking noise and it ends up being the injectors.

On another note why was your exhaust manifold bent, from an accident? Could the bending of the exhaust manifold have damaged another component that is now causing the click?

icarusfalling

The exhaust leak, and the clicking sound are totally unrelated. Both sounds were very noticible when I first purchased my 4runner, so I fixed the exhaust manifold leak. But now I notice the clicking sound much more than I did before I fixed the exhaust leak, because the noise from the manifold was masking the clicking sound from the engine.

I guess I'll go ahead and order some amsoil and see if that helps with the clicking sound. Does anyone know where I can go to order some for a good price? Also, what is the URL for gaget's website?

Thanks for your suggestions