dreaded ticking noise

[cobra venom]

could some one explain to me this dreaded ticking noise i hear so much about. my 03 does not tick but i have only put 6000 kilometers on it. please explain exactly what this noise is and how to correct it. is there any pre-ventative maintenence that could be done? any info would help

[dwtalso]

The "tick" is actually several different issues that have been lumped together because the sound is generally almost identical for all the issues. They emanate from the left side of the car, often seeming to come out of the left fender well.

One is cold piston slap which occurs on startup and fades when the motor approaches operating temperature. The forged pistons have a higher expansion rate than hypereutectic pistons so they are made slightly more loose. This results in a little tick or knock at startup. It's not normally a bad thing unless it persists well after warm up.

Another cause is an incorrect torque spec. that was used during the assembly of the cam ladders in the heads at production. This is actually called out in TSB or SSM and this is what my car had.

There is one more head tick that I never heard a definitive cause for. After all other TSBs and SSMs are applied, it results in a head swap. Some folks speculated that it was the valve seats in the head deforming under heat because the back of the left head doesn't get as much coolant as it probably should. But no one has ever proven this to be the cause so I dunno.

There nothing you can do for the slap. The only thing to do for the cam ladders is check the torque spec.. As for the last tick, some folks claim to have solved it by adding some plumbing to the back of the block and left head to put more coolant through it. But I've never seen any evidence to indicate that this actually solves the problem and plenty of cars with the mod get the tick and plenty of cars without the mod go many miles with no tick.

The dealer can eventually replace the left head if the tick persists but even this doesn't work 100% of the time so there might even be other issues at hand.

Additionally, no one has even proven that any of the ticks are detrimental to the motor. In fact, I know several '03's that have fairly high miles now, spend time at the track, and have the tick. They didn't want the dealer pulling their head off; it doesn't impede performance and no one can claim their motor died specifically of the tick.

So, I wouldn't worry about it too much until it happens to you and then just let the dealer do the basic TSBs and memos. Then decide how far you want to go if the dealer wants to do a head swap. Lots of them have been done and many were successful in solving the problem...but not all :).

[jgruggs]

What he said ^. If you have the "bad" tick , you will know it.

[cobra venom]

thanks for the info