New lifters still noisy after engine rebuild.

[WilliamWallaceGS]

Hello all,

Just wrapped up my rebuild of my 1994 Ranger 4.0. Sent the block out to a machine shop and had them go over it, new bearings, rings, seals, etc. Threw in a Melling High Flow oil pump, Comp Cams 410 Cam with 95tm heads, JBA headers, etc. etc. All new sealed power lifters, rocker arms, and 5.555" push rods from Smith Brothers.

Before I tore the engine apart, I didn't have any lifter tick, but I bit the bullet and ordered all new lifters because I was doing a complete rebuild. I soaked them in oil for several days before installation.

I've only driven the truck a few miles, and I've had it idling for a total of maybe 20 minutes to check for leaks and whatnot. I have a lifter tick that's pretty noticeable standing outside, but inside it's not that bad.

So the question is, how long does it take for lifter noise to go away? I definitely don't want to rip the thing apart again to replace NEW lifters. I didn't measure for pushrod length, but went with what was recommended on a few forums I read around on (including this one), so I'm pretty sure my pushrods are the correct length.

I just got back from my first drive, and I'm letting everything cool down so I can double check my header bolts and spark plugs and all to make sure that may not be making the noise. But if it's not, how long does it typically take for brand new lifters to finally fill and become quiet?

 

[malohnes]

I soaked mine in tranny fluid before my install, though I reused my old ones. My ticking went away after a few drives and 15 minutes of idling. No noises now. Remember the break-in period for a new engine may take a while. Also, make sure the rockers are tight, I found mine not to spec after my top-end freshening. What oil are you using, weight so much brand, synthetic or coventional?

 

[WilliamWallaceGS]

Interesting, I've never heard of soaking them in trans fluid, what's the theory behind that?

I made sure I tightened the rockers evenly to spec (I think it's 24 ft*lbs), then another 90 degrees according to my Haynes manual. I can't imagine those things are loose.

I stuck mine in a bath of 10W-30 for several days before the install, and now I'm using conventional 10w-30 for the break in, plus a bottle of lucas break in lube that was given to me by the machine shop (high zinc content). I've read around that it takes a while for the noise to go away, but daggon this is crazy. I just got back from driving around for about 30-40 minutes after snugging up my header bolts and checking the plugs, and I can still hear the ticking. Before I'd have the occasional dry start tick, but it would quiet down within a minute or so. I'm just trying to see what other 4.0 owners have experienced, anyone else?

She does run pretty good though with all of my upgrades, I kept it under 3k RPM since everything is new, but I can already tell a significant difference from before.

My exhaust is horrendous now though, I've got a CAT bolted up to the y-pipe, but that's it. It's way too loud, and I'm not a fan of the straight pipe sound. I have the muffler and all in my garage, but I need to take it to a shop to get everything welded up.

 

[Benjam]

My lifter tick went away after a few minutes of idling after the rebuild(s)..

No offense, but are you positive it's lifters? My injectors are rather noisy and almost sound like lifters.


Benjam

 

[malohnes]

ATF is a high detergent oil and works great to clean internal components and lift off varnish.

I wouldn't worry about it too much, if the noise does not go away at all, or does not reduce in any way after having some run time, then I might be a bit concerned.

I'm sure the more experienced guys here will have more answers. Don't forget to use the forum search. There as TONS of posts on lifter/valve train noise.

 

[Anime]

Usually it is the rockers rather than the lifters that make noise, and the lifters only do so when the rocker arms get worn and create a gap that the lifters can't fill, which in turn makes the lifters go bad over time.

I'd say if it doesn't go away after a few days of use, you'd want to pull the valve covers and check the rocker arms. It may be as simple as needing to re-torque the rocker arm assemblies, but if all the rocker arms have lots of play, the pushrods may be the wrong length. Did you get new valve springs? Old stock springs are usually too weak for the comp cams, even with the 410 you'd at least want new springs.

What octane gas are you using? Usually with 95 heads and the higher compression, you'd want to use 92-93 octane to prevent knock and ping. I've had ticking noise from bad gas before, even on a stock engine. It usually goes away after a few tanks of good detergent gas.

It is possible you have a bad lifter or a few bad ones as well. If everything else checks out and the noise doesn't go away, I'd say you're stuck pulling the heads and checking the lifters one by one. Hopefully you can get any bad ones replaced under warranty, but obviously the hassle and cost of gaskets bites the big one.

 

[WilliamWallaceGS]

No offense taken, I'm pretty sure this isn't an exhaust leak or fuel injector noise. I typically can't hear fuel injector tick standing 5 feet away from the truck like I can this noise, especially over the exhaust at the moment. Although I have heard some noisy injectors, it's nothing like this.

I had about 1/4 tank of 87 in when I first fired it up, but I ended up filling it up with 93 on the first drive, but I haven't really put many miles on this thing yet.

I used brand new sealed power springs in the heads, as well as rocker arms, pushrods and lifters. Although the noise didn't seem nearly as bad the next day, I ended up pulling one valve cover just to check on some things, and my rocker arm bolts on that side were tight. I rotated the engine over a few times in different spots to check for any slop and watch the rockers to see if anything stood out, and everything seemed tight, I couldn't feel anything being loose (i.e. pushrods). I didn't do the other valve cover, just this one.

Once I get my exhaust installed, I'll start putting some real miles on the thing and report back. I did note that some of my lifters seemed to fit a bit tighter than the others in the lifter bores (i.e. did not just drop in, but I had to SLIGHTLY tap them in even after being lubed with fresh oil), so I'm not sure if maybe the tighter clearances on a few of these are reducing oil flow enough to cause them to do this, and just need time to wear in, but that might be a longshot. Thanks for the replies, keep them coming if you have any other insights.

 

[Benjam]

Curious.. where did you get your lifters from?

Benjam

 

[WilliamWallaceGS]

I bought my lifters from Rockauto. They're new Sealed Power lifters, half were made in Germany, half in China if that makes a difference.

But to be honest, now I'm not so sure it is valvetrain noise. Benjam you got me thinking about my injectors. I did the screwdriver to ear trick on my valve covers, and the noise wasn't amplified. I could barely hear anything from the valve covers, not like I would expect with this noise I have. My injectors on the other hand, you could clearly hear them working (as you should be able to), and I could even feel a lot of pulsing just by touching them. The noise itself sounds like the typical injector tick amplified by about 10x, vs the knock knock/diesel noise of valvetrain slop. But I've never heard of them being this loud before.

I'm using my OE injectors, and I soaked them in gasoline before the install to clean them up. I didn't disassemble and clean them before the install. They were working fine as is, so I didn't even bother, maybe that's a cause. More troubleshooting to come.

 

[sector9]

I rebuilt my 4.0 a little over 10,000 miles ago. When i first started it in made the worst ticking sound you've ever heard. that ended up being a collapsed lifter.

there was a huge gap

you can see the one on the right was collapsed. i got the one warrantied but my engine still has this tick your talking about. I was thinking i just got a bad batch of lifters but Mine does it some days and not others, i cant tell if temperature has any effect. Would temp effect injectors?

 

[WilliamWallaceGS]

Crap dude, I seriously hope that my lifters aren't defective like that. I think I'll be sick if they are, especially since my OE lifters were quiet as a church mouse, but I bought all new ones since I was doing a complete rebuild. There is nothing worse than rework, especially since everything is painted, grease/fluid residue free, and NOT leaking, and tearing everything apart risks messing all of that up.

I'm not sure if temperature would affect injectors or not. I never really notice much of a change in my other vehicles as far as heat and injector noise. But if an injector is bad or going bad, it may be a different story. Again, I'm not sure.

Now that I have pretty much all of the other bugs worked out, I'm going to put some miles on her this week (only have maybe 15-20 so far on the whole thing). Friday I have an appointment at my local shop to get my exhaust fabbed up, so I'll get their opinion on my noise and see what they think. God willing, it will be gone by then and I won't have to worry about it.

 

[sector9]

My oe ones were quiet as can be too and same injectors I have heard running a little tranny fluid in the oil will let them loosen but I haven't tryed yet. I know the feeling of not wanting to pull apart a new engine. It was weird to see it all clean when you take it apart.

 

[WilliamWallaceGS]

Quick Update:

Got my exhaust installed on friday (sounds SWEET) and got my shop's opinion on my noise. They think it's valvetrain related just by the sound, so that's not good at all, but they said to just drive it around some more and see if it goes away. I've put about 280 miles on it now after driving around a bit this weekend, and nothing has changed. It's very quiet when it first starts up cold (like this morning at around 50 some degrees you could barely hear anything), but once everything warms up it's back to ticking.

It doesn't go away at speed either, you can hear a fast "tick tick tick" noise even cruising at 60 mph. Since everything is new, sludge is not an issue, so I wouldn't expect any sort of additives to "cure" my problem. Sounds more like complete mechanical failure, which is a complete bummer. RockAuto says that there is a 12 month warranty on these things, so hopefully Sealed Power customer service won't give me a hard time whenever I tear into this thing to replace these lifters.

So the plan now is to get to my first oil change (to about 500-600 miles for the break in period), change the oil and see what happens. If the noise is still the same after that many miles, I think it's a safe bet to go ahead and start tearing into the engine. I'll keep everyone posted.

 

[WilliamWallaceGS]

Man, just did some fluid checks on the truck, and there was trace amounts of oil in my coolant when I popped off the radiator cap. I've got about 350 miles on everything now. Daggon, I'm hoping it may be residual from the heads or some got in the passages during assembly, but I'm not holding my breath. When I pull the dipstick everything there is good, heads are brand new castings, new EVERYTHING. Coolant level in the overflow has gone down slightly since I topped it off before I started driving it again, which is why I started this little investigation in the first place. Looks like I'll have to pull the heads now to fix this leak AND the lifters.

I'm puzzled, I did everything to spec, made sure all mating surfaces were clean, torqued the heads and intake manifold in sequence. I used plenty of RTV around the head/intake manifold coolant ports to prevent something like this from potentially happening. Stumped.

On a good note, I did get 19.4 mpg on my first tank of gas. Not bad considering I got a consistent 20mpg before. It's a lot more fun to drive now too.

 

[Benjam]

I hate to tell you this, but that sounds just like a lifter..

Reason I asked where you bought them from is because I had one go bad within a couple months of a fresh rebuild. I got them from Northern Auto Parts and they warranted it out for me with no problems.

I had no warning with mine.. Started it up one day and it sounded like a diesel.

I believe it's a little quieter when cold because the lifter is somewhat pumped up with oil and as it gets worked it cant expand back as fast as it's supposed to.

Yes it sucks taking everything apart again, I know . You get really good at it though.

Benjam

 

[koda2000]

keep an close eye on the coolant level to see if it continues to drop. could just be residue oil from having things apart.

as far as the lifter noise. does it sound like just one lifter or multiple lifters ticking? if just one, figure out which side of the motor and pull that valve cover and see what you find.

as far as getting a replacement lifter (if that is the issue) that would seem to be the least o your problems...

 

[WilliamWallaceGS]

I'm thinking what I saw in my radiator was residue from the heads. The heads came coated with an anti-corrosion oil/grease all in them, and I'm wondering if the machine shop didn't get every little bit out of the coolant passages. I checked again last night and there was barely any oil residue in there compared to the day before, and nothing in the overflow bottle.

It only sounds like one lifter, maybe two, but it's not all of them for sure. I'm pulling the driver's side VC this weekend to have a look. I remember one or two on that side being much tighter in the bore than the others (actually had to tap a few in place, not like a press fit or anything, they still moved around freely when I rotated the cam, but didn't just drop in like the others). I'm wondering if it's tight enough to prevent adequate oil supply to the supply hole in the lifter.

 

[WilliamWallaceGS]

OK, pulled my Driver's side VC this AM to see what I could find. I thought I found the culprit, but now I'm not so sure, here's what I did.

I rotated the engine by hand until both valves for each cylinder were shut, then I rocked on the lifters back and forth with a screwdriver between the rocker arm and the valve spring. I was able to get some slop on one lifter (near the area that I suspected) by hand repeatedly, but then once I cycled the engine some more, everything is tight on that same lifter/valve, NO movement. It's almost like I had burped out an air bubble by doing this, but I can't confirm.

Now there are a few other rockers that I can initially get a little bit of movement on by pushing on the pushrod side of the rocker (again, in the closed valve position), but then it rebounds back, and everything is solid and I can't get any movement UNTIL I rotate the engine over again to the same spot. Then I get the same little slop, rebounds back, and everything is tight. I'm thinking this is abnormal, but I can't figure out why it rebounds without slop every time.

I verified my pushrods were the correct 5.555" specified.

Now I'm stumped, I pulled the rocker shaft off, removed the pushrods, and pushed on the lifters by hand with decent force (using an old pushrod) and they were all solid, they didn't move. Some are still a little tighter in the bore, I rotated everything by hand without the pushrods, and I was able to move about half of them back down into the bore. I squirted a bunch of oil directly onto the lifter area just to help with lubrication while I was doing all of this.

So now I'm really stumped, I was expecting to see a completely collapsed lifter similar to the pics posted by Sector9 in the earlier post, but nothing. Visually the plungers look like they're in the right spot (i.e. not collapsed), and I can't get any movement by pushing down on them.

I'm at 500 miles, I'm going to go back and put the VC back on, reassemble everything, change the oil with Conventional Valvoline 10W-30 and a Fram Tough Guard filter (I know some people hate on FRAM, but I've used them forever and have had no issues), and see what happens.

 

[WilliamWallaceGS]

Well, I changed the oil and took it for a drive and still tick tick ticking away. So I pulled the lower manifold so I could watch the lifters as I cycled the engine by hand.

The gap that I described earlier is actually slop between the lifter and the cam lobe. After cycling the engine, if I push on a the pushrod side of the rocker (not all of them do this), I can see the entire lifter move down into the bore until the roller hits the cam. Then when I release, I can see the plunger move the rocker back until it touches the valve, and then there's no more slop, I can't move it by hand again until I rotate the engine over and have it go through an open/close cycle.

So this does sound like I have a few bad lifters eh? Even though they rebound back when I push on them, they should still take up all of the slop from the cam lobe to the rocker arm. It's like there's something inside the lifter causing it to stick, and it just needs a little more force to push through it, then it's all good until it compresses again.

Your thoughts? I also thought that maybe my pushrods were too short, but since the lifter takes up all of the slop after I press on it, I'm pretty sure that my pushrods are still OK.

 

[Benjam]

Still sounds like a bad lifter to me.
at least one anyways..

I had to cycle the engine over a bit and recheck them all till I found the culprit, just like you are. Make sure you note which one is the problem child in case you can only get one warranted.

Your pushrods are fine.

Benjam