I have my 2000 TL at the Dealer as we speak, same noise (tick) worse when cold. They have torn down the top of the motor and discovered that this ticking noise is actually piston slap caused by excessive wear on the #3 cylinder. I am getting the run around from Acura because my car has 72K on it and I am the second owner. I went to look at the engine before committing to $5K in repairs and noticed the valves on the #3 cylinder combustion chamber were white (burn to a crisp). This is the cylinder that was worn and causing the slap noise. What is interesting is that this cylinder was running lean (too much air, not enough gas) which causes combustion chamber temperatures to significantly rise which in turn breaks down the viscosity of the oil. Once the oil has broken down the cylinder starts to wear and eventually cause piston slap (engine noise form the piston hitting the side of the cylinder). I am fighting for an answer and for Acura to pay. My next step is to have the dealer pressure test the heads.



Any other ideas on this issue would be much appreciated

 

I got that problem too on my 99 TL. I tried adding that Lucas Oil Stabilizer and that didn't work.

JQ.

 

-posting 'cause i'm interested- *waiting on ftty and mrsteve to respond

check the spark plug on that cylinder. what does it look like?
^^should tell you what to do

 

if it was a too hot symptom, there could be acouple causes. a bad sparkplug,or a bad coil, or semi a clogged injector (all kinda unlikely). also could have been in the computer, something telling it was too rich (all it takes is once) and it went lean causing excessive heat and damage. once that happens well you get the symptoms you have.
on a mechanical stand point it could have been a sticking valve (should have noticed rough running) or a ring that went bad. with out physically seeing the engine its hard to give an exact "what happened"

 

I noticed this noise, all be it faint, approx 20-25K ago. At the time I was not using an Acura oil filter, I was using a K&N, so I thought it might be a relief valve or drain back problem. The engine did not idle rough and had plenty of power. The #1 cylinder also had noticable wear (not quite as bad as # 3) and the vlaves on that cylinder were also turning white (also indicative of lean mix problem).

This problem must have been going on for some time, possibly since the car was new. I am thinking it might be a defective head casting or a defective O2 sensor. I was talking to a car buff who said it might also be a faulty wire causing the injector to close prematurely due to an impedence that is too low.

As it stood I was trading punches with Acura Client Services until I discovered this lean mix problem. My case had been rejected by Acura, but I have fought to open it back up. Acura has said they stand behind their product and guarrantee it to be free of defects. It looks like this is either a design or MFG defect and I expect Acura to forfill their promise.

Anybody else have any idea what could be the culprit?