1999 Dodge van engine noise

From : nza

Q: never changed either. would just dump in a quart or 2 of whatever was the cheapest and ride. the rings and cyl walls must really be tough in the 318. leroy .

Replies:

From : geekboy

i like the van but damn... its a lot more maintenance than my 85 or my 75 ever required... i had a 99 ram with the 3.9 and ran the crap out of it but did mantainace on it regularly. never had a problem. this vehicle seems like it was not taken care of very well.. oh yeah the fuel pump is singing also so no telling when that thing will strand me... .

From : geekboy

i finally got around to replacing the water pump on my 99 v6 ram 1500 van.. i have never seen a water pump eroded so badly... it even eroded the timing cover a bit...... anyway while i was there i undid the maybe previous owener did not put proper coolant mixture and just kept adding water to radiator. remaining bolts of the timing cover and replaced the timing chain as well. also whilst i was under i noticed the drivers engine mount had separated. replaced that for $10. engine runs better than it ever has since i have owned it. still puffs a little smoke on startup... what i am worried about is a noise i hear that is reminiscent to a rod knock. however unlike the normal rod knock this noise quiets as the engine gets to operating temperature. could be an exhaust leak which sounds like a broken lifter then as the manifold heats expands closing off the leaky area. is the 39 litre v6 prone to piston slap does it have hypereutectic pistons or something this pig only has 120k on it and i really need it to last as long as possible... i paid $1000 and had to immediately replace the drivers side stub axle carrier. this last service i installed a new timing set