I just changed my oil in my 03 discovery now i have a loud ticking when warm. so i dropped the oil again and put in the rottela 5W40 synthetic with lucas additive synthetic but still ticks. The truck has 100,000 miles on it. should i flush the system as per Disco Mike suggest or should i run it like this until my next oil change hoping i clear itself out?
thanks everyone for your help.

 

You would probably want to do an oil pressure test with a manual gauge, do it cold and with engine warmed up, at idle and 2000 rpm. Ticks can be several things, including : oil pump cracked, SAI system components, flex plate cracked (engine to tranny), and the always unpopular slipping cylinder sleeve.

While flush may help, running and thinking it will cure itself with time might not be a good idea if it happens to be the oil pump.

 

thanks for the advice. i will be going to auto zone to get a oil pressure gauge where do i hook it up and what size fitting do i need.
thanks again

 

The oil pressure warning light switch is just behind the oil filter area on the passenger side (NAS). It un-screws, and you use a 1/2 X20 thread adapter to what ever the oil gauge wants (at least on a D2 4.0 block). Pix attached from RAVE

 

i will check this weekend.
i'm wondering if it could be the flex plate that you mentioned.
reason being is the problems started with the crankcase position sensor. within a few weeks my starter went. than my valley pan gasket had a major leak after fixing the valley pan was when i changed the oil for the first time than the ticking begun. does any of this point to the flex plate.
Thanks again for helping me through this

 

Not really.

 

Do not use oil additive, it counteracts with the motor oil.
Read this.
Car maintenance bibles: Oil Additives

And pay special attention to this.
Your Opinion: A Ford Engineer contacts carbibles.com about additives

In 2006 I was contacted by a Ford engineer who has worked for them for 24 years. These views do not necessarily represent Ford, but it makes an interesting read nevertheless.
Some of the things in your site are true like the pure baloney that additive companies put out. I have been with Ford for 24 years in research and development for their power train division. I have forgotten more lube problems than 90% of so-called mechanics will ever know. I like the way some mechanics make statements like they're some sort of God without being able to back them up. All that mallarkey in some of the feedback above claiming 800,000 miles on a gas engine are laughable. There is so much that goes into producing engine oil that dumping "magic" additives into it is just criminal. The quality of most addatives is questionable at best. Whilst the names may be similar, the quality is not. Additives are blended at the proper rate, heat and in the proper proportions by the manufactures of their particular product. Crude supplies are not all the same quality and the additives have to be adjusted for the quality of the base stock being used by each particular company, per batch. Dumping your own personal stuff will more than likely be way inferior to what the oil manufacturer uses. The chemicals will normally differ from the manufacturers blend, and can cancel each other out to the point where there will be no anti-wear properties left in the product. (This is one reason it's not wise to mix oils from different manufacturers together). Changing the oil from say Mobil to Shell and then to Pennzoil will have a negative effect on your engine from conflicting chemicals. Buy an oil that you may like and STICK TO THAT COMPANY'S product.
What you may get away with when using Shell may cause instant havoc with Valvoline. The major oil companies work closely with the auto manufacturers so that bearing material, seal material, roller bearings, ball bearings, and all other moving parts are not adversely affected by the oil products. This is especially true for automatic transmissions. DO NOT USE SOMETHING OTHER THAN WHAT IS SPECIFIED BY THE CAR MAKER FOR YOUR AUTOMATIC TRANSMISSION.
Nothing in your site mentions surface finish of the journals, cylinder walls, lobing of the crank journals, or a whole host of mechanical reasons for engine life or engine early death regardless of what oil you use. Nobody has mentioned how wear is affected by hotrodding the vehicle. I can ruin any engine and oil combination that you want to give me in a few hours or less. I can wreck a transmission in 15 minutes.
What about user abuse and manufacturing defects? Grinding a crankshaft in the wrong direction of rotation will eat up the bearings in 5 to 10 minutes. Quality control during manufacturing is the key to long engine life along with following oil- and filter-change intervals as laid out by the manufacturer in your handbook that comes with the car (that nobody reads).
From Ford's perspective, they test Mobil way more than other brand. I pushed using Mobil synthetics for transmission use to eliminate low speed hot oil low pressure and the opposite problem of high speed high pressure and cold oil drag at any speed. More power is lost from pumping torque than from bearing and piston drag. Trying to keep oil pressure up to spec when hot requires a larger pump and more R.P.M. and when things are cold the pump has very high torque and most of the oil flow is going thru the pressure relief valve back into the oil pan. Wasted horsepower; it lowers gas mileage by 20 to 30%
If it takes only 12 to 15 horsepower to move the average car 60mph. and the engine plus the transmission are using 2 to 3 extra horsepower each due to high oil drag (being too thick) you can see how the C.A.F.E. ratings would not be favorable for Ford if we did not use synthetics. Engines on new Fords come with semi-synthetics and the dealerships only use this oil. Full synthetics are still better but cost more.
Conclusion: Read, learn, and use your brain.



Read more: Car maintenance bibles: Oil Additives

 

When you check the oil pressure, do it from a cold start, check at cold idle and 2000 RPM's and again at idle and 2000 RPM's when hot, then get back to us with the 4 sets of numbers.