VR6 Valve Train Noise

[Bob Dutton]

I will give you guys a little history on this motor. It is in a 95 Jetta GLX with a 5 speed manual trans. It belonged to my daughter and has 90,000 mile on it. The coolant pipe broke on it when she was in Palm Springs and she drove it untile it stopped. Since then I have resurfaced the head, done a valve job, replaced the valve guides, replaced the hydralic lifters, replaced the cam chain tensioner, replaced the two upper cam chain rails, replaced the oil filter, and changed the oil.

Now the problem - The valve train, after all this, has a very noticeable ticking noise. Using a long screwdriver and placing it on the valve cover at each end of the motor and my ear at the other end, the noise is much more noticeable by cylinders #1 & #2. I first put the motor together without replacing the lifters and noticed the noise, replaced the lifters and the noise was still there, then I replaced the chain tensioner and the noise was, again, still there. I guess it's possible that a new lifter could be defective. I would not be worried if the valve train had a slight, evenly balanced tapping noise across the whole valve train but this seems way out of whack to me.

I was told that the oil system in the head on this motor has one or some check valves in it and one could be stuck open and not allowing the correct oil pressure, at the lifters, to be maintained. I looked in the shop manual I have and there was no mention of any check valves in the head’s oiling system. The project has been finished now for about 175 miles. Not having ever worked on one of these motors before and given my experiences and impressions as stated above it seems that this loud of noise, concentrated around one valve, would be a problem that would not get better with miles. What do you guys think it might be? - Bob