When the car is cold I'm starting to hear the car sound a bit 'big-endy' if that makes sense, and although it gets much better when its hot, you can still just about hear it. At least I think its the big ends, unless someone else has a better idea. The car has done 124,000 miles.

So, I'm wondering if its easy enough to drop the sump and change out the big ends, and whilst I'm at it, the oil pump as well, just so I don't have to go through the palava twice. Is this an easy job? I've thought about taking off the head and decoking that too.

Anybody done this already? is it an easy job.

Thanks

Andy

This is what I have heard. It could be pistons that cause sound at cold. B200 is known to be little noisy at cold when there is even little wear in cylinder.

Think I agree with jtbo, this sounds more like piston slap. Big end knocks usualy get worse when hot as the oil thins out. How long has the noise been there?

I don't really know. I've been noticing it in particular for the past couple of months.

If the noise has been there for that long it seems even less likely it's big ends, once they start to rattle they usualy get worse in a big hurry. Big end knocks are usualy audible as a sharp rattle when starting from cold, dissapearing as soon as the engine gets oil pressure, ie 1 or 2 seconds, When the engine is running, the knocking will normaly get worse with increasing engine load and/or speed, and usualy more noticeable with a hot engine as the oil gets thinner and gets squeezed out of the bearing more easily. Piston slap is a slightly higher pitched noise, and is caused by the piston rocking in the bore as it changes direction, this noise tends to be more constant, and slowly goes away as the engine warms up, it may well be audible at idle with a cold engine, I seem to recall that 700 series cars suffered with this a lot, most of them seemed to suffer from it.
hope this helps
Iain

Its very audible as you pull away following a cold start, ie engine under light load, also the de-revving when you change gear.

I can also get it to do it but to a much lesser extent, when the engine is warm. So its sounds exactly as you describe. Thanks for the heads up.

Is this likely to get worse or cause any other problems? I suppose the cure isn't easy either. Bore out + new pistons I guess. Hundreds of squids....

I have done this job, but not on a 300 - it was fairly straightforward as the crankshaft was still within tolerance and only the shells needed doing.

If the crank is worn the engine will have to come out.

According to Haynes it is possible to do without taking the engine out.

Check for worn bores with a compression test - if they are really bad you`ll be burning oil in any case.

If you want to do the top end you may be best off getting the lump on the bench and giving it a complete overhaul - especially if the condition of the rest of the car justifies this

In addition to doing the oil pump you may want to check the sump plug threads and get them chased out if required - can save a lot of grief if they`ve been knackered by a QwikShit spanner monkey in the past.

Might want to wait until it gets a bit warmer though....

If you go for a rebore, it shouldn`t be to bad if you can strip and rebuild the engine yourself. a lot of the cost is labour charges for doing all the fiddly stuff.

Might be more cost effective to get a scrap car with a good engine though.
Rust is your friend here with a fair few early 300s rotting out before the engine is past it.

Will

Thanks, Will, but having heard what the other guys are saying it sounds more like piston slap, which is a whole other ball game isn't it?

If it's piston slap, as long as the engine is not burning oil an engine suffering from piston slap will usualy carry on going for a long time, but its hard to tell how bad it is from here LOL Mabe get a second hand engine and rebuild that for when the time comes?

You can perhaps hear here little piston slapping as my car does it also. I'm not sure how well different speakers will play that sound, though.
Anyway, right after start it is loudest, then microphone started to adjust itself

http://www.janiervast.com/videot/winter ... start2.mp3

My car hardly makes any noise at all, even when you start it up, but only when you pull off, ie: put a light load on the engine.

Thanks for the recording.

That 'klapetiklap' sound is much more powerful when I accelerate lightly with cold engine, when it warms up sound will faint away.

My car ain't drinking oil at all between oil changes oil level stays precisely where I have filled it, car has done around 219 000km now, can't remember precise number.

Big ends...not exactly a famous redblock failure, especially at that mileage. I'd vote for 'slap too - mine does it ever so very slightly. There are well documented cases of redblocks doing hundreds of thousands of miles after the onset of the 'slap. Unless it gets a lot worse, I'd relax about it. The cold weather is probably behind the sudden deterioration.

Having said that, if you want to sell your car to me...

Speaking of Air con, I now have some schematics courtesy of V*DIS Want me to email them at some point?

cheers

James

Thanks, I've already got the whole of that program, but I've also got the service and workshop manual for the 360 air-con.

Erm, I thought about getting a scrappy engine, putting it in the car and then rebuilding the original engine, maybe in the summer time so I don't have to freeze my bits off.

I wonder, firstly how much a scrappy, but running OKish engine is and whether oversize pistons are still available from the dealer? I'd rather go OEM parts rather than pattern if poss.

Ooh...service manual...if you don't mind me asking, where did you get hold of those?

Scrappy engine....£50 or so for the longblock if you do well? If you do a swap, I wouldn't bother rebuilding the original. Redblocks usually make it to well beyond 250k before needing a rebuild, and unless yours has had a very hard life (not likely - it's fairly hard to stress a B200!), I can't see it being piston slap. Mine knocks a little for the first couple of minutes, but it uses a negligable quantity of oil, and shows no obvious signs of wear. In other words, it's a mild irritation at worst. The only redblocks I hear about with piston slap 'to worry about' are turbos that have been kicked hard, and VERY high mileage NA cars (300k+).

cheers

James