Been getting a ticking that I knew couldn't just be the lifters. With all the miles, I suspected the timing chain guides might be in bad shape. I used a mechanic's stethoscope and could hear some noise on the lower left. I basically parked it for much of the summer for fear of the chains jumping. Opened it up today and found broken plastic guide bits laying around. Lots of missing plastic and an entire guide gone. The tensioners are probably shot too. It's a wonder it kept running. Previous owner was bad with oil and it shows. I ran full syn once I got it and it never ran low. About 345K mi on it right now. I see a Cloyes timing kit in it's future.

Just opened. The upper guide, is completely missing. That's a piece of it sitting there. Chain sits low in the bottom guide because it's running on metal vs plastic.



How it should look




If anyone is trying to pull a harmonic balancer on a 4.7 with a 3 jaw set from Harbor freight, use the 100mm puller, which is 3rd if going from largest to smallest.
Configure the puller as pictured and lock onto the inside, on the part my fingers are holding. Took me hours fiddling with these things till I found the right setup, so thought I'd share. Doesn't help that the motor is in the truck.






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I'm pretty sure you're about to drop the pan, but you want to get all the junk out of it. The only 4.7 I've ever worked on was full of garbage. The previous owner of that one was also bad about oil changes. The sludge had stopped up the oil pick up and there was a thick layer of sludge in the pan.

 

Hell no I'm not dropping that pan. I don't think that's too easy on a 4.7, LOL. With almost 350K, I'm getting back in decent order and that's it. I was hoping I could sneak in the guides without pulling the chains and valve covers but that's not happening.

Despite the previous owner, the engine is still very tight and all cylinders have great compression, so I think I can get 500K out of this thing. Tranny shifts like it's reading my mind. .

 

Think I would at least flush the pan...... Dump some solvent in there, let it sit for an hour, then pull the drain plug. Let it all drain out, then pour some more thru it with the plug out.

 

I'd be worried some of the pieced made it down to the pick up screen. A bore scope would be helpful here.

 

The pan on a 4.7 is probably the easiest pan I've ever dealt with in the vehicle. It's flat all the way around. One of the few good ideas on late model engines. Here is what I found when I dropped the pan on my '03 Ram 1500.




The sludge in the bottom was about an inch thick and the pickup screen was stopped completely. I didn't even have to raise the engine. I don't know about a 4X4, but there was plenty of room between the engine and frame. Drain it, remove the torque converter cover then the bolts and it drops right out.

Do you REALLY want the sludge and plastic going through your fresh timing chains?

 

On most of the full size trucks, dropping the pan is dead easy. Plenty of room to work... On the daks though, everything is much tighter, and the 4x4's are IFS, with the front axle in a fixed position. Makes dropping the pan MUCH more of an exercise, and I am not entirely sure it is possible without dropping the axle, or lifting/removing the engine.

 

Maybe on a Ram, which is a big chassis, but this is a 2WD Dakota. If it was easy, I'd have done it a long time ago. I flush this motor around every 3 oil changes but good Idea to flush while things are open. I've never had an issue with oil pressure, aside from when the sender went flaky. Yeah, I'd love to clean out the pickup, etc. Don't recall if the pan has to be pulled to pull the oil pump. If not, maybe I can pull it and have enough access to the pan to fish stuff out.

 

Being 2wd, you can probably do what I've done on past repairs. I worked on a car once that had little room underneath. I don't remember what it was but I pulled the bolts out of the engine mounts and placed a jack with a flat piece of wood under the oil pan. I thin lifted the engine until the top of the bell housing was against the firewall. I then placed pieces of 2X4 under the engine mounts and got enough room to work. Some of the bolts were tight, but were accessible.

 

This may help someone in the future who is researching timing cover seals for the 4.7. The timing covers have undergone changes over time and the flat gasket with built in seals that I got (TCS 46000), won't work for my particular engine. My timing cover has recessed holes for the coolant ports, so the last two seals 46022 and 46022T will work. Difference between those two is one has a ready made gasket and the other, you apply the RTV.







My timing cover. Note the recessed holes for coolant flow....



Stock image of another 4.7 timing cover.... no recess. Works with first gasket kit.