[vipergg]

Yes that is a common side effect on the 3.0 specially on high mileage engines . It is lifter tick .You could try a different brand oil filter and if its not too cold in your area go to 10w-30 instead of 5w-30 . this seemed to help our 96 . Synthetics will make it worse . Also some people swear by a product called Auto-RX . You might want to go thru a treatment of that , have heard of this curing this completely in some cases . any way go to their website and decide for yourself . Also if you don't know how many miles you have on the timing belt you might want to change that if you plan on keeping it , this can be a pretty expensive repair though so be prepared , never been a fan of belts over chains...