OIl pump pickup o-ring or Oil pump seal o-ring.

 

If it's not that, it's piston slap.

I picked up a clatter driving home 35 miles on the freeway, it's loud enough to sound like a bad rod bearing. First things first, tho, diagnosis. One potential cause is the balancer keyway being broached out, another the hydraulic cam tensioner. Checking both is the same process, take off the fans, belts, the crank pulley (check it) then the cam belt covers. Reinstall the pulley to help keep the belt on, start it up and pry the tensioner down with a long screwdriver to take out any slack. If so, replace. If not - two things checked instead of guessing.

 

The top cam cover bolt behind another bolt dead center is hard to get to, and holding the crank still means either renting/fabricating a spanner or just using a long breaker bar on the 22mm against the "frame" under the battery and cranking it to loosen the bolt.

 

If you have access to a good used tensioner compress it slowly to get the installation holes lined up (over an hour in a vice) then hold with a thin allen key to extract when installed.

 

If it's not that and is another bad bearing, again, then setting it on fire and rolling it down a hill isn't out of the question. I've replaced the motor and then the trans 30 days later, hard work for an old man of 60. But that's another story.

 

99 Foruster S. No, it's not misspelled, it's ugly.

Edited November 14, 20178 yr by tirod