Changed oil, Now can hear the timing chain making noise???

[syclone01]

I've had and messed with many cars in my life but this has never happened. I have an 07 rav 4 with the v6. I purchased it several months back and has ran just fine. I changed the oil several days ago and used mobil1 5w30, upon cranking it up with hood still open and letting it run for a few mins to check for leaks i noticed a noise coming from the timing chain area of the engine. I thought at first it was noticeable because i had the hood up, so closed the hood and even from in the vehicle i can hear it. I have driven the vehicle for a few days since and it's still there. I only hear it when idling, or very low rpm. I would have noticed this before the oil change and i definately never heard it before...It's almost like the oil is too thin and either causing the hyd lifters/tappets or the cam chain tensioner to not exert quite enough force to take out the slack. I guess i can put some 10w30 in it and see if that changes anything. I have heard of some GM trucks not recommending the real thin weight oils because they cause too much slack in lifters and cause some noise...any ideas???

[rav4two]

Recommended factory fill is 5w-30 and I've used Mobil 1 in that weight since new without any of the type of noise you're hearing. I believe the newer recommendation is actually for a 5w-20 oil that is even thinner.

Is this the first time you've changed the oil in your Rav? Is it possible that the previous owner used a much thicker oil to cover up that issue?

[syclone01]

I got out my mechanics stethoscope and it's the water pump that's making the rattling noise. The day before i changed the oil i took a 700 mile roundtrip and basically just parked the vehicle, then changed the oil the next day. The pump must have really started to go bad during the trip. I have just noticed that it's a pretty common problem for the water pumps to go bad on the 3.5 toyota motors at around my 86k mile mark. And from my few looks at it, it's a pretty involved job due to the location of the pump. Yay for me...

[RTexasF]

Toyota says the engine has to come out to change the pump but I've heard a few enterprising techs found a way around that. Don't know the procedure though.....

[Rav408]

Yay for you is right! BTW, I run 10W-30 in my 4 cyl because it runs quieter and the wife likes it better than the 5W-30. So it makes no difference if you want to go that route. Might just loose 1 mpg, maybe.

[Carbon]

Originally Posted by rav4two

Recommended factory fill is 5w-30 and I've used Mobil 1 in that weight since new without any of the type of noise you're hearing. I believe the newer recommendation is actually for a 5w-20 oil that is even thinner.

I had thought there had been a statement that 5w-20 was OK for the V6. I had my first oil changed with 0W-20 at the dealer (I brought my own). I am not able to find such a statement now. So the *w-30 weight oils seems to be the requirement for the V6, and I will be sticking with those.

[Climbitnow]

[arries289]

Did it have the original coolant in it? The method used to change the pump without removing the engine is to remove the right and left engine mounts and tilt the engine up.

[JuneBug]

Why do the RAV4 V6, Camry V6, and Highlander V6 all have different oil recommendations in that chart? Don't they all share the same engine?

[RTexasF]

The way I read it the RAV V-6 is approved to run 0W20, 5W20, or 5W30. Odd they don't even show 0W30 which has been around for a while.