Hello from South Carolina

[Robert8096]

New member here with a 2000 Nissan Frontier with the KA24DE engine. Truck was purchased new from the dealership by my father-inlaw. When he passed the truck was slated to go to my son. He was not old enough to own the truck so it was given to my brother-inlaw to drive until my son reached the age of ownership. My brother-inlaw took real good care of the truck and return the truck to my son. Son drove the truck for about two weeks and decided he was going to trade it for a clapped out Ford 4X4 truck. Mom did not like this idea and purchased the truck from my son. I drove the truck for a few years with no problems. Truck was maintained for all the years that me and my brother-inlaw had the black flash as we called it. Son went thru a number of vehicles over those years with mom buying most of them. My wife got tired of buying cars for the son so the last time around she gave him back the Frontier. Within a few months he ran it hot and had to replace the radiator and water pump. He drove it for a few more months and let the timing chain jump and destroyed the engine. Mom had had enough and took the truck back. Mom had a customer who was a so-called mechanic that owed her money so she had him install a junk yard engine. It took us almost a year to get the truck back and was in real bad shape when we got it back. The engine sounds like it has a bunch marbles in it and the goof ball disconnected most of the working AC system and left it open to the elements. One AC hose missing and a lot of small parts missing off the engine. The truck now resides in my driveway and I joined this forum to get advice on bringing the truck back to a usable condition. I have restored a number of Chevy C10 pickups so I know my way around wrenches but not so much about these KA24DE engines. Looking for advice and guidance from the experts from this forum. Sorry for the long post and I am going to start a thread in the proper section on the state of truck and what you experts would recommend to be the next step.

[centralcoaster33]

Hey Robert, welcome to NICO Club! I hope you get your truck up and running again soon. The KA is a pretty tough engine. The marbles sound reminds me of "timing chain rattle". You can search that and see it's a common issue for these engines and that there are solutions out there like removing some timing chain guides and checking the timing chain tensioners. The timing chain rattle is most noticable from the top front of the engine where the chain goes over the cam gears. As far as other connections and missing bits, perhaps photos of the current state of the engine bay will help. Again, best of luck with the truck and welcome!

[Robert8096]

Timing chain parts are on order. My engine does not have the upper timing chain guide that is mentioned in the threads about timing chain noise. Removed the valve cover and looked at the upper chain and the tensioner and only saw slight wear on the plastic part of the upper tensioner. Could not see much of the lower chain. Missing small brackets like the one that holds the air tube to the radiator support. There is only one Frontier in the pull a part yards around me and when I went to check it out they told me no parts off the truck because it was a running and driving with a good title. I'll post up pics but when I tried that in the other area of this forum I got a message that I was not allowed to post URLs.

Pics of the truck




Youtube video of the noise.