Loud engine tick.

[s10blaza]

I have done a few searches and all point me to either a few collapsed lifters or a worn top end. My 93 Explorer has been doing this for over 7 years, it now has 198K miles on it and to my surprise it still runs strong which is why I would like to fix it intead of rebuilding it. The noise makes a loud, annoying ticking from both sides of the heads, when started it ticks extremely loud, then after a few seconds quiets down then starts ticking again. It only quiets down when warm but doesn't go away. Its loud enough that it can be heard a block away. It does this idling, in gear, reverse and the ticking is coming from inside the valve covers.

Being that this is our secondary vehicle, my parents don't want to invest $1500 in a brand new engine, but we're tired of giving it the band-aid fixes. Since my mom will have to start driving it while her other car is getting fixed, she wants to get it taken care of. Could it be to just have the rocker arm assembly and pushrods that need replaced? Or do my symptons sound that it is the lifters themselves? Say for example I only buy the rocker arm shafts and pushrods, is there a way to test the lifters without removing the heads?

 

[cfkane]

Search the forum for collapsed lifers, you will find good descriptions of the symptoms and the effort required to replace them.

 

[Rhett]

If it's not the lifters, it could be a leak in the exhaust manifold, too.

 

[Az_NavajoRob]

Yeah, just replace the rocker arms and pushrods. I found a guy on Ebay that redoes the rocker arm assemblies and sells new pushrods with them for about $150.00 shipped.