Just changed the oil to 5w20 and this also changed my "tick" - now I get it at idle while hot, after the engine is shut down for several minutes. Also get it much more consistently than before. The interesting thing is that the sound appears several seconds after startup and will gradually disappear after about 3 mins at idle, it will also disappear with a couple of revs, even only up to 1000 rpms. Also, have noticed that since this whole problem and repair started, I've had several instances when the engine won't start immediately - it still starts but the starter turns a bit longer. Anyway, the dealership changed my tensioner free of charge, I paid for a new belt. Needless to say this didn't change anything. We agreed that I'll drive several days to see if things get better or worse.

Does anyone see anything logical in what's happening to this engine?

 

OK, so the latest tests from today are pretty surprising - the tick is there ONLY with the a/c off. The moment I turn on the a/c the sound disappears immediately. I tried more than 10 times and the correlation is 100%. a/c on - no ticking. a/c off - lots of ticking. And it's still coming from the front cover. Remember I changed all the timing components...

What could this be? Any ideas?

 

With the extra load of the a/c the engine should increase the idle to compensate for the demand. The faster idle would give you more oil pressure. Also, are you absolutely sure that the idle bearing in the a/c pulley is not bad and making a racket when the a/c is off?

 

The rise in RPM with the a/c on is barely noticeable on the odometer, maybe less than 50. I did not know about the idler bearing on the a/c - will check it.

What happened with the tests today was that with the a/c off and with rpm's above 1000 the racket was still there. So I think this would exclude the a/c putting a load.

It's strange because I drove for a couple of days with 15w45 and then changed to 5w20 which is causing much more noise. If it's the oil pressure wouldn't it make sense that it would be the opposite? Whats the normal oil pressure reading - I will pull some data tomorrow and post it.

 

remove your belt and start the engine see if the noise goes away. Goes without saying to just run it for 30 seconds or so since your water pump won't be running.

 

Yeah we did that already in the dealership but the noise wasn't there in the first place so it was quite a useless exercise. I will have to repeat the process myself - thanks for the suggestion! Will see if I have time to do this tomorrow... otherwise I'm quite baffled by the whole thing since I was certain it was the timing kit - there was evidence of the chain slap on the front cover and some damage on one of the chain guides. We did change everything concerning the timing...

 

2007 Supercrew, 180k. After researching the issue here, I tore into the truck, expecting a bad tenionser or broken guide. Spent several hours getting the front cover off, only to find that all the timing components look good and chain is snug, and cam phaser's are good. So I went back and rechecked the rockers, and found one loose that I missed earlier. It's the one closest to the firewall on passenger side. I'm guessing it's loose due to the lash adjuster, as I can't really see it at this point. Should I replace all of them and rockers, just all the lash adjusters, or just the bad components? Thanks.

 

Hi guys,
I have 1999 5.4 Triton in my F150.

The engine turned off on me while I was driving.
Turns out there was 'no' !! oil in it. As we first didnt figure out what the problem was. We tried cranking and the engine turned and even run for like 5 seconds. It did not sound good.
Should I fix the chain set and tensioners?
Or is replacing the engine my last choice?

Thanks !

 

If I was you, I would replace it all while you are in there, you can't tell if a phaser is sprung until you remove it and you cans tell if you have a bad tensioner seal until you remove it, parts are cheap, the labor is hard.... You're half way there, why not just replace it all and make your truck run like new! ... Good luck

 

the whole set of adjusters and followers for entire engine is about $300. You've done all the hard work already change th all and the tensioners as well since you're already in there. They're probably snug now but leak down over night.