Hey all,

I've done extesive searching on this topic, and the prognosis looks fairly grim... I have a slow ticking noise coming from the back-center firewall side of the engine, it seems to happen only when the car is allowed to sit and idle for a while, and it rises and falls with the rpms. otherwise, the car is very quiet and behaves as normal. If I drive the car when it's ticking, it promptly goes away after driving for about 1 min. Now that I realize what this could be, I'm nervous to drive it. its a 1999 a4 1.8TQM with 58,000 miles, and the timing belt service was done aprox. 10,000 miles ago, but aparantly the tensioner was not replaced, and i'm worried that this tensioner is on the way out. It's due for an oil change in about 1500 mi. but the oil level is perfect and the oil looks very clean. someone please help me! I want to take this to the dealer today!

 

they changed the TB but not the tensioner? don't ever go back to that mechanic/dealership. that's your first problem.

 

yes, i agree, but I'm in a bind and they have a loaner car I can get. Also, I'm gonna try to stick them with the fact they didn't do the timing belt tensioner, mabye since it's before the service interval for the TB mabye they can do something like a recall.

 

The tensioner is the most important part of the change. But the threads are talking about the cam tensioner, not the TB. If it starts sounding like a diesel, then its the cam tensioner. But it could also just be loud valves like on all euro cars

 

Ok, stealership got back to me, turns out the ticking noise is the cam tensioner, and they say it will cost $1200 to replace. I know I can get this part from ECStuning for $179. Is this a job I can handle myself, or is this crazy hard? I think it's on the backside of the engine, which makes me nervous, any thoughts or advice? please?

 

It's a preatty easy job to do if you know some about cars, replacing the cam chain tensioner. If you do it yourself, I would replace the chain while your in there. Some people don't. They do get streched.

 

thanks all for the quick responses...

Is there a write-up somewhere for this? I have a haynes manual, but it isn't worth two ***** as you may know. I'll check when I get home to see if it has any info, but any insight or pictures or a write up would really help, i'm not looking foward to this one...

 

ok, update! I bought all the parts from ECSTuning, couldn't be happier with their service. I have the tensioner and a new chain, and all the gaskets to go with it. The car goes under the knife saturday morning at 6:00am. Well, hopefully. I might be having a stunningly attractive girl spending some time in the hot tub with me friday, so we'll see how early I get up saturday...

ima try to do a write-up, so be savy.

 

Looking forward to a write up and any problems or tipsthat you might have while your doing this job. The symptons you described for your car sounds excatly like mine. Its only clicked pretty loud like 3 times in the past 3 months and if u drive it it goes away pretty quick. It rarely does it though and sounds fine otherwise. I know im going to have to change it one of these days, maybe when you complete yours ill feel better about tackling the job.