Jsmply

Honestly I recommend you throughly compare your s2k to other s2000's. It could be the timing chain tensioner or any of the above mentioned ideas, but it could be NOTHING. I bought my car with 2,000 miles on it and around 5,000 miles I started noticing the SAME ticking noise that drove me nuts. It sounded like a fast ticking noise that increased with RPMs and was mainly noticeable from 3000-4000 RPMS and after that got drowned up by engine noise. It was/is most audible when passing by a bunch of walls. I literally drove myself nuts over this. I had a bunch of owners listen to it, I took it to two different dealers, eventually I got really paranoid and paid a performance shop to pull the valve cover and inspect the retainers and do a valve adjustment with like 7000 miles on the car. In the end I finally realized it was just the normal sound of the s2000 and I just didn't notice it before. After I stopped thinking it was going to explode, now I never notice it anymore again.

Bottom line, compare it with a few other s2000's throughly and see, it might be the timing chain tensioner (which is a common part to go bad) or a few other things, but it might just be normal. If you haven't mis-shifted the car and you've been taking care of it, then don't lose any sleep over it. Just get it checked out. If you don't have any local members who can help, perhaps you can go test drive a new/used one when you bring it to Honda for service.

One other thing I want to point out is that when I was freaking out over this exact same noise, I did LOTS of searching on here and I found TONS of posts just like yours. I think its alot more common than you think. The reason why a lot of the people who reply don't realize it, is because they are not hearing what you are hearing and its probably normal noise to them. Again, I'm not saying you should neglect the car and not have it checked out, I'm just saying that its very possible that its nothing at all!

Hope it helps,

- J

mikegarrison

Fuel filter? Let me guess, you haven't tried to do this yet. Report back when you have done it....

^AnDre^

Ive been bringing in the car for the scheduled honda maintences and paying through the nose for whatever they do, so i hope they were chanigng the fuel filter (I assume they did/do at least.. they just did all the fluids across the car not too long ago, tranny, diff, rad, brake, clutch, etc.


I do drive the car pretty hard on a regular basis.. not going 10/10ths.. but pretty good... never treat the transmission bad (never a burnout or clutch drop.. not into drag racing... never miss-shifted or treated the tranny badly, but I definatly give the engine and brakes a workout everyday.

Jsmply

I'd bet the car is fine then. Try to compare it to others at a local meet.

whitemistress2k

No need to fix it, if it aint broke...

TheCarGuy2021

before you go do a timely valve adjustment yourself or pay someone to do it and pay for a new chain tensioner, get a screwdriver with a solid plastic butt, put the tip on the valve cover and your ear on the end of the butt, if you hear the same ticking but louder then it is the valves and/or tensioner, BUT if you hear minimal noise, put the tip on the fuel rail and listen. If you hear a loud ticking then it is just your injectors...

hope this helps,
sam

mikegarrison

If they say they were changing the fuel filter, ask for pictures.

Folks, this car has no fuel filter.