Ok, so my car was running perfect all day today! I turn it off, come out of my girlfriends house to leave and now its making a horrible ticking sound! It sounds like it is coming from around the spark plug area of the engine. It does it at idle and the higher the RPMs and BOOST get, the louder the ticking gets! It sounds like either a playing card stuck in the spokes or a leaf stuck under the windshield wipers! I checked the oil and it fine! My oil pressure and temperature, fuel pressure, EGTs, Boost and AFRs all look perfect still even with the ticking sound! I can also slightly smell oil! Please help fast, im supposed to drive to Cincinnati tomorrow, but I believe we will be taking my girlfriends car but I need to know what this could be! Thanks!

 

lifter collapsed?

Rod knocking ?

Spring retainer let loose?

Exhaust leak?

Injector malfunction?

 

ok, ill check those, I know its not an exhaust leak because when I put my ear by the spark plug cover, it gets louder and louder as you rev it up. Will any of those show up with a CEL? I tried to get it scanned tonight but advanced here broke their scan tool!

 

Does it sound like a "ticking" or "tapping / flapping" sound? If its the latter, pray its not Rod Knock...

 

it sounds like when you put a playing card in the spokes of a bike.....or like when you spin something that like clicks or taps against another object as it goes by it each time.

 

Honestly, I could be a number of things. I've had experience with Rod Knock and it sounded similar to what you have described. The higher the revs, the louder / faster the tapping sound became. Good luck my friend. I hope its nothing serious...

 

if it is rod knock, what does that involve in order to fix it and about how much? Because yes, it does get louder and faster with higher rpms and higher boost.

 

Rod knock = New motor. Or Rebuilt/Rebuild your motor. Ushally rod knock can go away with more rpm.

I wouldnt drive/start it at all untill you find out what's wrong.. Have you installed cams latley?

 

yea, i installed cams about 10K miles ago, but they were perfectly silent untill tonight.