Start Up Troubles

Took my 1998 Nautique out of storage, and fired it up today. And there was a ticking noise once I reved it up a bit. The sound was not there last year. All I did was winterize and change the oil. Any hints to fixing this problem?

Thank x

It is coming from the top of the motor. It ran fine when I put it away. It probably is a sticky lifter. Anything you can do about it, or will it free itself?

Never discount a simple leaking exhaust manifold gasket. A quick fix will get rid of the noise in this case. The tick from this leak is very mechanical sounding. Try to really dial in the location of the tick, concentrating on where the header meets the head.

You can add some Rislone to it. It is an additive with detergents that will clean a stuck lifter. If it continues to tick after a few hours of running it could have collapsed and will not pump back up. I have a bad one in a jeep that I get to replace because it collapsed. I say all this on the premise that you dont have an exhaust leak. Definately check that first....

Brad
PS every auto parts store will have the Rislone. It is in a yellow bottle.

M3 has a very good point about the possible exhaust manifold leak. Especially since you say it doesn't occur at idle. I agree that you should rule this out first. These two problems make ticking sounds that sound amazingly the same. After you change the manifold gasket, if your tick is still there, run your engine till it gets good a warm. Put it in the water and take it for a spin and let it completely warm up to operating temp (15-20 mins or so). Now, do this only if the tick is not loud. If you have a loud tick, your valve train is hammering itself and damage can result. It the tick is loud or doesn't go away you will probably need to replace the lifter.