03 4.7 V8 Dakota is making Knocking/Ticking Sound.
 

My 03 4.7 V8 Dakota is making Knocking/Ticking Sound. I have taken off the valve covers to check the rocker arms and everything looks good. I have also checked the Exhaust and don't see or feel any leaks. I have posted a video on you tube of the noise it is making. Any suggestions would be awesome.

I will move this to the correct section.

Does it do it worse when it's cold? Hot? Under acceleration? Deceleration. Could be piston slap, wrist pins, lifters, timing chains. How many miles on the engine?

I think more info is necessary to make an educated guess.

it has 143K miles on it. Oil level has always been good. Only coes that have been coming up are evap leak codes which I changed the gas cap and fixed a few hoses and only time will tell if that issue is fixed.

no real change based on temp.

what about acceleration does it get worse it doesn't sound like the upper end

yes the noise gets much louder the more I accelerate.

I also took the stethoscope to the engine today again. I still cant find area that is making the sound without a doubt. It looks like the noise it loudest when I touch the tip of the probe to the valve covers on each side over the chains on top. It is also around the same volume when I touch it to the exhaust mounts on each side on the bottom. I also patched up the holes in the exhaust toward the back of the tail pipe and banged a lot of crap out of the Cat-Con and the Muffler. I am 95% sure the noise is not coming from the compressor or the pulley bearing. I drove it around for a few hours this morning before doing all this work to it and noticed the noise does get a bit better the longer I have been driving it (hotter?). Does this info help anyone?

Have you removed the belt and checked the tensioner pulley? Check all the other pulley while you have it off. Some might suggest to start it and see if it still does it but I personally don't like to do it.

Just trying to give some suggestions to try that would be a whole lot cheaper first.

check the water pump mine was making a bad chunking noise turned out to be the pump. I took the belt off and started the motor and the noise was gone also spun it by hand and what a noise

Take the belt off and run it for about a min. Do this when the engine isnt hot. This way you will know if its the water pump,ac,tensioner ect. What oil are you running in it?