badazzsupamax

Ok, so after allowing my car to sit for a year and a half because I thought I had a bad lifter or valve, I then realized that it may be the VTC's. I grounded them, changed the oil and put in synthetic 5w30. I also used some Sea Foam in the oil. I used the Toyota YZZA2 M1-103 filter. When I first started the car, no noise! It was completely smooth and steady. It was actually very quiet. I then turned off the car to bleed my clutch master cylinder/booster. When I started the car back up, the dreaded clack began coming back, slowly but surely. As I drove around the block, the clack grew stronger. By the time I got back home, it was full strength again. I am really starting to hate this engine and may look into a VQ. What the hell? What else could it be? Any ideas, comments, questions?

Greeny

iTrader: (43)

the trick is to have a good loud radio

Levsimus

iTrader: (1)

Just how loud do these VEs get? I've never heard the VTC clatter in person, but it's always scared me away from the VE motors.

DMad8724

iTrader: (4)

really depends. sometimes it can be a light chatter, sometimes an extremely loud knocking. sometimes it goes back and forth. sometimes its only just at startup when its cold.

but full on raging ticking VTCs can be extremely loud/embarrassing/ridiculous to drive.

James92SE

iTrader: (31)

If he grounded the VTC's and still has a lot of noise going on his issue isn't the VTC's. Unless of course the VTC's are so bad off he's nearing a catastrophic failure, but I'd doubt that

jdcorr918

When I was living in the country and every journey was on the open road I never used to get VTC noise. Within a week of moving to the city driving in stop start traffic I started getting loud VTC noise.

I have reduced my oil change intervals and started using semi-synthetic 10w-40 and I'm now starting to win the battle and get a quieter car.

Changed the oil and filter yesterday using a K&N HP-2008 and I have not heard a clack yet. Still early days but looking good.

If the car has been sitting it might take a bit of work and a few oil changes to get the engine squeaky clean on the inside and to get rid of the noise. By adding seafoam and fully synthetic oil you might have freed up a heap of gunk that needs flushing out. I wouldn't give up on it just yet.

badazzsupamax

Its so annoying tho. It's ridiculous that we have to do all this, and for what, a little bit of top end gain? Grounding Vtc's, using Toyota filters, spending tons of money trying to get this thing right, it's crazy if u ask me. Is all of this really that much more better than the VQ30? I think I'm gonna go ahead and try either the VQ30 or VQ35. I've had my fill of VE's clacking and screaming for everyone's attention just to embarrass me! Well, that's how I feel now anyway. So we'll see. Maybe it IS the lifters or valves?

akurtzer57

iTrader: (4)

I love my vg but the 35 in my 6th gen is awesome. If was simple swap I would have already done it in my 3rd gen. For some reason I've never been fan of the ve. No idea went.

Ajnemesis

We would see those every so often at the dealership. When they start making noise, the only two options were to replace (at like $800 per unit) or live with the noise. There is a reason the VE30 only had a 2-3 year existence. It typically isn't anything in the rocker assembly, being that they are roller rockers (without conventional lifters). The noise that you would get from lubrication issues would be entirely different, and there would be other signs.

chrome91

iTrader: (1)

could be a collapsed lifter then if you grounded the VTCs

youre running 91 or better octane in it right? VE need premium petrol, if youre running 87 or something the noise could be predet

Hectic

iTrader: (20)

There was a TSB and a repair kit, and was covered in an SIR volume

badazzsupamax

I didn't put any gas yet. It's the same gas that's been sitting in there for a year and a half. It's pretty low anyway, so do you think filling it up on premium will change anything?

chrome91

iTrader: (1)

hard to say but VE do need at least 91 octane

todamax

iTrader: (6)

This is a blast from the past for me. My Maxima has been gone for a long time, but I had solid VTC experience that I can share.

The clack on my car was 'loud' and grounding did take care of it. Grounding didn't result in an idle change, but did decrease performance. I eventually took the VTC's apart and rebuilt them (actually wasn't hard at all) I had found the rear head's timing chain was off one sprocket, and while I hadn't seen idle change with grounding, when the VTC's were rebuilt and the timing was set correctly, it was very smooth. My car had low miles at the time of my repair, I think about 70K.

A close friend also had a VE engine Max, grounding didn't have an impact on his VTC's. His car had 170K on it, and we learned the hard way that the clacking wasn't the VTC's, but was the timing chain tensioner. The tensioner pads had worn through and the chain was making a slapping sound. This of course ended with a chain failure and the destroying the head.

Hectic

iTrader: (20)

Pretty sure that SR20's suffer from VTC noise as well, it's a wonder they are so popular.