I had this rattle coming from my engine, on the first cold start recently. It would rattle for a couple minutes, then fade away.

http://s41.photobucket.com/albums/e2...urrent=001.mp4

I listened to the engine, with a stethescope, and the noise was much louder when holding the scope on the rear timing cover. I thought it could be a loose tensioner rattling against the adjuster, and the timing belt was actually a year past due to be changed (over 8 years). The 03 V6 had 93,300 miles on it. I bought the timing belt, tensioner, adjuster, idler pulley, and water pump, and did the replacement last weekend. When the job was done, I started looking at the old parts, and there didn't seem to be anything wrong with the tensioner, but there were dark black lines on the idler and adjuster pulleys.


So I took the pulleys apart, and found that there was very little grease inside, and that the grease that was there looked dried up flaky and dark.


I don't know how this could have caused the engine rattle, but the rattle seems to be gone since they were changed.

Anyone have any experience with this issue?

 

How did the ball bearings and bearing races look?

What about the hydraulic adjuster?

Here's a video of the testing procedure @ ~0:30

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tz-89..._order&list=UL

 

The tensioner was good, no wear on the end, no sign of leakage, and I could not compress the shaft with all my weight pushing down on it. The bearing races looked ok, and the ***** were still in place. The lines on the pulleys and lack of grease in them, is the only things that were out of the ordinary, IMO, when looking at the replaced parts. The engine rattle has disappeared since then, so I can only assume the rattle had something to do with the timing belt parts.

 

9 days later, and still no engine rattle. Wish I would have opened up the new bearings, to see how much grease was in them. Could have easily added some. Oh well, at least the rattle is gone now.