Club 80-90 Forums

Please can anyone tell me why I have an occaisional noisy tappet? mostly the engine runs as sweet as,but sometimes from cold it taps away for about 5 or 6 miles then dissapears Im sure its only one of them.Its a 1;9 DG engine single carb and its done 130,ooo miles...should I just ignore it

ignore it if it going away ,

are you using the van everyday or just weekends ?

it will be one or more of the lifters going flat , and with what your saying its filling back up ok , leave it alone , if it get any worse or it wont shut up , changed the oil 20/50 mineral is good

Actually I live in it go everywhere and only stop driving to sleep so thanks I now have peace of mind

cool , is it due an oil change ?

No has just been changed I think twas semi synth 15/50 I used tho cant be sure But It was more noisy before the change Also I found a split in the servo pipe at the manifold junction so the motor was running rough anyway till i replaced this .This made me think a new motor was on the cards!!!!!

could be the oil you have used , what we have to remember is that these engine's are old and semi synth oil wasnt around 20 years ago ( or wasnt that easy to get hold of)
if it continues to be tappetly stick some mineral oil in it , is it noisey when its hot ?

No when hot she purrs like a kitten .

---the hydrualic tappets in these engines aint designed for semisynth-too thin---change it back to ordinary mineral oil & it'll be alright--Quantum oil in the blue cans from GSF is good--they also supply Manns oil filters which are as good as genuine VW at half the price--or any other 15/40 mineral oil-GTX or whatever--

Hi everyone,

The first thing I would say with all boxer engines (regardless wether they are Aircooled or watercooled) is never use synthetic oil. Always use plain mineral multigrade oil (such as 15W40, 15W50 or 20W50).

If any engine (regardless of which type) has rattling hydraulic tappets, the following steps can be done to cure it:-

- Check the engine oil level on flat and level ground. This is a fairly common cause.

- Check the oil grade, age and condition of the oil. Never use synthetic nor semi-synthetic oil. Any cheap mineral based multigrade oil will do. Always change the oil at the recommended service intervals. This is vital !!

- Drive the vehicle more often. This is also a common cause of rattling hydraulic tappets.

- Put Molyslip into the engine oil 200 miles before it's next oil change and then change the oil without Molyslip. This will usually quieten down the rattling hydraulic tappets.

- Finally if all else fails, remove the tappets from the engine, dismantle them and bleed the air out of them. Refill them with oil (whilst upright) afterwards and carefully squeeze them back together.

phade wrote:Hi everyone,

The first thing I would say with all boxer engines (regardless wether they are Aircooled or watercooled) is never use synthetic oil. Always use plain mineral multigrade oil (such as 15W40, 15W50 or 20W50).

If any engine (regardless of which type) has rattling hydraulic tappets, the following steps can be done to cure it:-

- Check the engine oil level on flat and level ground. This is a fairly common cause.

- Check the oil grade, age and condition of the oil. Never use synthetic nor semi-synthetic oil. Any cheap mineral based multigrade oil will do. Always change the oil at the recommended service intervals. This is vital !!

- Drive the vehicle more often. This is also a common cause of rattling hydraulic tappets.

- Put Molyslip into the engine oil 200 miles before it's next oil change and then change the oil without Molyslip. This will usually quieten down the rattling hydraulic tappets.

- Finally if all else fails, remove the tappets from the engine, dismantle them and bleed the air out of them. Refill them with oil (whilst upright) afterwards and carefully squeeze them back together.

Why must we never use synthetic?

The main reason not for using synthetic oil is due to it's thiness (in terms of how easily it gets through things, not viscousity), it tends to weep through gaskets and seals (and therefore leak oil).

This is the problem I had with my mexican beetle when I used to use synthetic oil. As soon as I stopped using it, there were hardly any oil leaks at all (until fairly recently, but that's down to pushrod tube seals).

My mexican beetle leaks no oil on synthetic oil. I run all my engines on synthetic and have done for about 6 years, none of them are modern designs. I have no leaks, slight consumption on one but theres other reasons for that, nice clean internals, no noisy hydrauilic tappets (they all have them).

Synthetics hold there viscosity better, they can withstand MUCH higher temperatures, they take longer to break down, they keep engine cleaner, reduce wear, absorb heat better.

If your worried about viscosty, you can get thick synthetics eg castrol edge 10/60 or mobil 15/50 infact they come in a bigger range than mineral.

Mineral oils belong in lawn mowers.

The only downside to sythetics is price.

So the debate continues...!?

Having just spent a wee while rebuilding my DG 1900, and not a few of your English pounds....the recommended oil was a semi synthetic 10/40 and a filter with a non return 'widget' in it ( I think!)

So are we saying my van's gonna go bang on this?!

Incidently, Ive just done the first 500 mile oil/filter change after rebuild, and all seems well (oil always gonna be darker at this point than when it went in!)

fairwynds wrote:So the debate continues...!?

Having just spent a wee while rebuilding my DG 1900, and not a few of your English pounds....the recommended oil was a semi synthetic 10/40 and a filter with a non return 'widget' in it ( I think!)

So are we saying my van's gonna go bang on this?!

Incidently, Ive just done the first 500 mile oil/filter change after rebuild, and all seems well (oil always gonna be darker at this point than when it went in!)

You will be fine with semi syn, better than mineral and cheaper than fully synthetic.

phew!