So this all started with me noticing a loud, rhythmic ticking sound under my hood near the tensioner pulley/head on the passenger side. I went online and looked around for others with a similar issue. What i found is most people saying that the timing chain tensioner was most likely bad and was causing the problem. So i purchased the new revised tensioner, removed the valve cover, zip-tied the timing chain in place (so as not to skip teeth), removed the old tensioner, "properly" set the new tensioner in it's locked position then installed and released it. Firstly, this did not resolve my issue. Secondly, while the valve cover was off i noticed that the red link on the timing chain was about two teeth away from the EXH triangle on the front cam gear. This would lead me to believe that i am off timing and may have been for some time (no CEL to speak of either). I have been advised to remove the serpentine belt and start the car and see what happens (trying to rule out the external pulley system as the cause of the tick). I plan on doing this today, but even if this does fix my issue, should i have the engine re-timed? Any help is greatly appreciated.

 

With the car off try wiggling the pulley belt tensioner these are also known to start rattling

 

I did that and it seems to wiggle a bit and sound similar to the tick i'm hearing but im not 100% definate that its the same. I should mention that when the car is running the tensioner does seem to wiggle a bit each time the car "ticks"

 

held the tensioner in place with a wrench while the car was running, no effect on the tick

 

Found the problem, BIG chunk missing from underside of serpentine belt. This resolves the tick. Any thoughts on the timing?

 

thoughts on the timing...

you're likely all set. those color coordinated exhaust picturing whatever marks should only be lined up when your #1 and #3 piston are at TDC (between exhaust and intake strokes). so what I'm thinking from what I'm reading, did you have the engine at TDC before you took out the old tensioner and when you installed the new one?

 

I didn't set it to any specific degree when i did it. So unless by some freak coincedence it was at TDC when i did it, i would say no it wasn't.

The disheartening thing is that this belt is 35 days old and i have no idea what would have caused this.

 

Most likely u didnt put it on all the way and it messed up when you started it making the belt jump all the way on one of the pulley's. If u notice a pulley rid damaged then u probably got a chunk of debris between the belt and pulley