rattling from under valve cover

[eddiec]

this is my first post to this forum so forgive if i have asked a question many others have before.

i bought this car saturday and it sounded fine while test driving it, but now when idling there seems to be a dull rattle coming from under the valve cover. i removed the cover tonight and will inspect thoroughly tomorrow, but a quick glance shows nothing blaringly wrong.

if anyone has suggestions on what to look for i would appreciate it.

[fate2k]

I had this problem in my twin-cam and it turned out to be coming from the timing chain during idle and would disappear when the rpm's rose. I changed the oil and filter, and it disappeared and hasn't come back since...I had just bought the car when this happened and the previous owner had some crap filter and unknown oil in the engine that had probably been in the car for 20,000miles...

[eddiec]

the oil did look a little crappy. what weight of oil did you use? i use 5w-30 mobil 1 in my ka powered frontier but was thinking this might be too lite of oil for this 198000 mile ka.

[fate2k]

5w-30 mobil oil (non-synthetic) mine had 198,000miles too.. interesting. Same year car, same mileage. Yours doesn't happen to be black?

[sk8erguy1501]

5-w30? wayy too light use castrol GTX 10-w40. the timing chain noise plagues almost all KA's. All you gotta do is just change oil and filter and you're fine. i had the same prob till i changed my oil yesterday and voila, it went away.

[Nathan]

Check the top chain guide as well, you can just take it off if it's even still there.

[eddiec]

thanx all

[240dreams]

it killed my ka. but that eventually led to my sr 12 days later. i love that timing chain now.