is this the dreaded tick?

[ozzie84]

ive heard about it since i first got a miata, but never had it, and all of a sudden this came up after starting her up this weekend....sorry for the crappy quality vid

[black roadster]

Where is your oil level at and when was it last changed?

[CosmosMpower]

My 93 had that. I changed the oil and then poured some stuff in the crank case and idle for a few hours and it went away. I forget what the stuff I used was but I think there's a write up on Miata.net. Mine was REALLY loud like yours and it actually went away after the procedure.

[trickyrix]

That sounds a little more wicked than stuck lifters...

[motorollow]

That sounds a little more wicked than stuck lifters...

Thats what I was thinking too.

[motorollow]

If it is just the tick on start up, you can usually turn off the engine for about 5 seconds and the tick will be gone when you start it up again.

[ozzie84]

click on the start up was on thursday or friday, the whole drive and being loud, since yesterday
but it is due for an oil change next month

[CosmosMpower]

I found my old thread. This was what I did.

ATF and oil changes (2TWISTY Flush). I don't think I did the kerosene part just oil and ATF and let it idle for an hour then changed the oil. My tick/knock was loud like yours.

http://forum.miata.net/vb/showthread...ight=HLA+noise

[trickyrix]

I had The Tick to wildly varying degrees - cold, hot, heavy oil, light oil, etc etc etc - and it never sounded that bad, although it sounded pretty bad at times. I tried a few of the M.net flushing methods and they all worked a little bit, but never made it go away completely for any length of time. IIRC, the one method that worked the best was to replace one quart of oil with Mobil 1 ATF for a whole oil change. That at least made the problem more of an intermittent thing for me.

From what I've been able to learn, your best bet is to pull the lifters out and either take them apart and thoroughly clean them (hunt on M.net for specifics) or replace them with Kia lifters (same part, but lots cheaper).

[ozzie84]

Kia? Really?

[POS Racing]

I know this has been asked already but have you checked the oil today??

[ozzie84]

just checked this morning when i filled up, and guess what im very low on oil...so im wondering what the crap happened, just did an oil change 2 months ago

[sammm]

^If it's not leaking it, it's burning it.

[CosmosMpower]

You should probably check your oil level more frequently than every 2 months.

[black roadster]

That sounds a little more wicked than stuck lifters...

That's why I asked about the oil.

Sounds like it could be rod knock. If so, you need a new motor or a rebuild.

[POS Racing]

Holy crap you haven't checked the oil in 2 months on a 20+ year old car! Wow...... Nothing kills a motor faster than low oil level.

Did you add oil to it this morning to get it back to full on the dipstick??

It is a good habit to get into to open the big flat door (aka Hood) on the front of the car and take a peek at the greasy bits on a regular basis.

[OZMDD]

I check oil on every fill up on every vehicle, even our 2013 Subaru. I also check tire pressure weekly. These things take <2 minutes, but will save you thousands of $$ over a lifetime of driving. Much like hand-washing, they become second nature if you create the habit now. I also have 240,xxx miles on the original motor on a 92 pickup, so that kinda indicates how effective periodic checks are at knowing the state of your vehicle.

[ozzie84]

Thus is the first car ive had thats pre 2005, since my first car, so never was even thinking about it

[MoonieGT]

I had a wicked ticking on my '91 at one point. I put some kind of cleaner stuff in the oil. That did nothing while idling. I let it warm up and I decided to drive the crap out of it (i wanted to do a 1.8 swap anyway). After a short drive of hard rpm the noise was gone and it did not return. I then changed the oil to get rid of the cleaner. YMMV. If you ruin your engine it's on you :)

[ozzie84]

Well i have been saving up for a 1.8 swap...