So I decided to try and concur the "Tick".

65K and the Engine is now out of Truck.

I did find that the oil pump was cracked in three places but others on the forum didn't think this would correct the Tick. Inspected the front cover housing and didn't find any cracks.

So I pulled the heads hoping to find a head gasket that had some marking on the firing ring indicating that the sleeve is moving up into it. FOUND NOTHING

Cam and Lifter are beautiful.

Pulled the #8 rod cap and both upper and low bearings looked real good.

Did not pull the rear main.

SO my question is there no way in hell that the tick was coming from the cracked oil pump?

I think the answer most will give is no that it is a slipped sleeve. Then why do I not see any marking on the head gasket firing?

If I decide to swap blocks with my spare 04' do I need to replace all bearing and piston rings?

 

What year?
Assuming 2003 or a 2004?

 

OK saw you are a 2004.
The loose liners make a very metallic tap when the engine is hot -
Engine warmed up and driven a few miles.
When the engine is cold, the loose liner can sound like a valve tap initially.
As it warms up, the volume increases 10x or more and the tap sound gets very metallic.

I can't vouch for how an oil pump with loose gears would sound.
My bet would be that the sound from the oil pump would skip beats here and there and would not be linear and exact as the tapping from a loose liner.

Sorry I can't be more exact for you.

If you could heat your engine to operating temp, then maybe you could get a liner to move and find out which one.

Commonly these are the inner 4 cylinders 3,4,5,6

Worn parts on the rockers shafts the rocker arms will make a loud rapping too if they are worn from oil starvation.

A bad lifter can also do this.

I replaced all the lifters on our 1997 Discovery II at 138,000 miles.
Now at 165,000 and no problems and no rapping.

Too bad you don't have a recording of the tap tap so we can hear it.

 

What doesn't make sense here is WHY WOULDN"T THE HEAD GASKET FIRING RING HAVE MARKING ON IT IF THE CYLINDER SLEEVE IS BANGING INTO IT MILLIONS OF TIMES???

The head gaskets look perfect.

I'm still leaning toward it being that cracked in three places oil pump. Once that front cover expands with temp the steel pump gears now have just enough room to hit each other.

 

if you go threw the old posts you will find that a cracked oil pump generator has been the cause of some ticks, but not all. I dont think you can track the tick down to just one problem on all engines, unless you just want to call it all bad manufacturing.

 

look on the bottom of the heads for the liner grooves not the head gasket, if the head gasket keeps the liners from hitting the head then your tick is coming from the down stroke as the liner bottoms out on the lip cast into the block at the low end of the cylinder. Did you get an oil pressure reading before tear down? Some broken gears put out good pressure some dont, if yours was weak your ticking might be from the low oil pressure.

 

You should never pull an engine before testing the engine, now that it is out, it is a guessing game.
Yes, the oil pump could nave easily caused the problem because of low pressure, here again, if it had been checked for pressure, you might be done and driving it by now.

 

Mike, I monitor oil pressure and temp all the time. The oil pressure at hot idle is 11PSI and 45PS at 2500RPM.

Its not a daily drive so I don't mind not driving it. Just want the tick to go away.

There is no room on the botttom for the Cyl to move downward since the sleeve seats at a lip.

The Number 8 Rod bearin was beautiful babbit material.

 

How could you not have a pretty good idea where the tick was coming from? Like Mike said you should have done some more testing before tearing out the motor. You could have had low oil pressure and had a tick everywhere, causing a combination of noise. Now you got yourself in a pickle because motor is out and you have spent lots of time tearing it down to find nothing but a cracked oil pump. Put it back together with a new oil pump and see what happens.

 

The oil pressure numbers dont seem bad for having a cracked pump gear. Are all the liners flush with the top of the block? Any variation in this could indicate liner movement.