Ticking, then knock, died...
09-16-2013, 12:08 PM
#1
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Ticking, then knock, died...
UPDATE on Post #7
99 v6 w/ 129k on the clock.
Was taking the 99' out and about a mile down the road a slight tick turned into a knock and the car lost power, then died in about 20 seconds total. Tried to start it up again and it violently knocks then dies, it also sounds like it isn't firing on all cylinders; the tone is different. The ticking/knock is coming from the bottom end. I found what look to be very fine and tiny metal shavings on the dipstick. I can hear the fuel pump on the accessory stage of key turn. No oil or parts through the block, and the oil pressure read normal. The plugs/wires are a year old, the coil pack is factory, but would that cause the insane knock/tick? Spun bearing?
99 v6 w/ 129k on the clock.
Was taking the 99' out and about a mile down the road a slight tick turned into a knock and the car lost power, then died in about 20 seconds total. Tried to start it up again and it violently knocks then dies, it also sounds like it isn't firing on all cylinders; the tone is different. The ticking/knock is coming from the bottom end. I found what look to be very fine and tiny metal shavings on the dipstick. I can hear the fuel pump on the accessory stage of key turn. No oil or parts through the block, and the oil pressure read normal. The plugs/wires are a year old, the coil pack is factory, but would that cause the insane knock/tick? Spun bearing?
Last edited by Tubra; 09-23-2013 at 02:35 PM.
09-16-2013, 11:47 PM
#6
Metal shavings could be anything, but that's generally a sign of major failure which will result in needing a new engine or complete engine rebuild. It could be a lot of things, but in short it's not good.
09-23-2013, 02:34 PM
#7
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Update
Alright, I had some time to look into it a bit more, here's what I found:
The oil ran dry. I had even checked it two weeks prior as I always try to and found it to be at a good level. Where did it go? Well I found the oil in the radiator sludged. I'm thinking the passenger side head gasket split letting the oil into the coolant. There was no smoke at all or any other symptoms. I put the proper amount of oil back in and it started up, albeit runs like an unbalanced washing machine. Got my mechanics stethoscope to track down the ticking and found one of the lifters on cylinder #2 (middle on passenger side) to be the ticker. Sounds like it ran dry and it borked it out of adjustment or completely, in any case it is very obviously running on only 5 cylinders. It ran dry for less than a minute total during the initially failure. I also for the hell of it got out my multimeter and found the distributor to be bad as well. I found the oil pan gasket to be bad as well as there is oil coated around the oil pan (not dripping) and both the valve covers have a light dry coating, again no drips. I also found a dry coating around where the upper intake meets the lower. All the gaskets went **** up. I guess the next step is to remove the valve cover on the passenger side head and try and figure out how bad it is. Not really sure how to figure if the engine is junked or not from here.
The oil ran dry. I had even checked it two weeks prior as I always try to and found it to be at a good level. Where did it go? Well I found the oil in the radiator sludged. I'm thinking the passenger side head gasket split letting the oil into the coolant. There was no smoke at all or any other symptoms. I put the proper amount of oil back in and it started up, albeit runs like an unbalanced washing machine. Got my mechanics stethoscope to track down the ticking and found one of the lifters on cylinder #2 (middle on passenger side) to be the ticker. Sounds like it ran dry and it borked it out of adjustment or completely, in any case it is very obviously running on only 5 cylinders. It ran dry for less than a minute total during the initially failure. I also for the hell of it got out my multimeter and found the distributor to be bad as well. I found the oil pan gasket to be bad as well as there is oil coated around the oil pan (not dripping) and both the valve covers have a light dry coating, again no drips. I also found a dry coating around where the upper intake meets the lower. All the gaskets went **** up. I guess the next step is to remove the valve cover on the passenger side head and try and figure out how bad it is. Not really sure how to figure if the engine is junked or not from here.
09-23-2013, 09:09 PM
#9
You won't know if the engine is "junked" until you remove the heads, drop the oil pan, and pull the internals. You need to make sure the cylinder walls havn't been damaged by any shavings that got into the engine. You also have to inspect the pistons/rings/rods/crank for damage as well and just take it from there.
09-24-2013, 10:20 AM
#10
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You won't know if the engine is "junked" until you remove the heads, drop the oil pan, and pull the internals. You need to make sure the cylinder walls havn't been damaged by any shavings that got into the engine. You also have to inspect the pistons/rings/rods/crank for damage as well and just take it from there.