My girlfriend works at a ford dealer, kind of how im buying a new truck, my new truck is a 2010 SXT with the 4.6L engine. My girl works in the service dept. as a service writer and she looked up any issues before we bought our truck and found that they can sometime have tapping noises in these engines.( Not all have this issue) However Ford does have a fix for this, Ive seen the paper that she brought home. What they do however, was not on the paper, but i can find out. So when you take your truck in for service tell them and get it taken care of. Remember the person behind the counter (The service writer) isnt trying to screw you, there trying to help you. Try not to yell at them, it doesnt really help anyway. good luck.

 

My 08 4.6 3 valve engine ticks and taps loudly at light throttle between 700 to 1200 rpm , sounds terrible but the dealer says its normal and to try motorcraft 10w 40 to try to hide the noise. They showed me a message from Ford stating this.To me thicker oil sounds like a band aid for something they do not have a real fix for.

 

Is that in an Explorer? F-150 didnt get the 4.6 3valve till 09' up.

 

Yes it is in an explorer. Has anyone put the 10w 40 in ? Did it stop the noises ?

 

yea cam phasers make a clicking sound on the top of the engine toward the front but was resolved around 2007 because i had a 5.4 in 05 and it did it but not until it got to 112000 miles

 

My thread, with a picture:
https://www.f150online.com/forums/20...9-4-6l-3v.html

It was this on mine. Dealer replaced it and it went away. If you unplug momentarily, you'll notice the sound stop.

 

I notice the same noise on mine. Just switched to Mobil 1 5w-20 and the noise is nearly gone. I have 30000+ miles on mine.

 

mine does it too... 3v