yet another issue with the '96 Caravan...

Could be "spark knock".. pre-detonation/ignition.

High mileage 3.3's had a problem with rocker tower cracking that would cause noise. I believe that this problem was corrected before the 1996 model year.

-Kirk Matheson

What is mileage?

Rod knocks are caused (usually) by oil problems, A-1 cause is letting the oil level go too low for too long, too many times.

It sounds like someone's taking a ball peen hammer and slamming it into the side of the engine block, the sound definitely sounds like it's coming from inside the engine. And it's loud and all the time.

Ted

Does it match the engine rpm or the output shaft (wheel) rpm? If it is the latter it might be an inside CV joint that has gone bad.

Welp... The van died. I'm assuming that the engine seized up on me, and I'm also going to assume that it was, in fact, rod knock. It did sound like a ballpeen hammer banging against the inside of the engine.

Tuesday afternoon, the oil light came on, which was odd because I had just dropped a couple of quarts of oil in there over the weekend. I checked my oil level and it appeared to show that all was fine. Not being one to chance it, I added 2 more quarts of oil and the light went off. I get off work and headed home. About half way there, the light came on again. This time, it was accompanied by sluggish response when accellerating (I did try to keep my rpm's between 1500 and 2000 though). I stopped, checked the oil, which, again showed plenty of oil. I added 1 more quart and the light went off. I drove about two miles and the van was barely moving. I decided to pull off the road and just as I tried to make my way over, I heard a "POP" and the engine stopped running. Right now, it won't even attempt to turn over.

Why do people equate oil volume and oil pressure? They are two different things. Why do you add oil if the level is correct? (1) if the level is in fact correct, but there are other problems, overfilling is not going to fix anything, and (2) Overfilling can in fact create a new problem that the engine won't survive even if the original problem is survivable. Not saying that your original problem did it in, but you didn't help by continuing to add oil.

Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')

Adding two quarts above the full mark is a sure way to kill an engine even if it didn't have a problem before.

Matt

That was a sad story, wasn't it? You know how it is, most people don't think, and they're happy that way. Instead of just putting "oil" on that light they should put "oil pressure not volume"

Sad, but true.

If the alert had stated "oil pressure low", there would have been no confusion over what the problem was. All you get is a little light of an oil can, that's it, and you're left to your own devices to figure out what the issue is. Now the really odd part of this whole story, is that even after adding oil, the level NEVER changed. It always read the same on the dipstick.

It kind of doesn't matter anymore, there's a guy coming to pay for the van tonight.

Glad you're able to get something out of it.

In your second post you described adding 5 quarts over a period of just a few days. At one point, the dispstick showed the level as, in your word, "fine", and you immediately added two quarts. As a believer in the conservation of mass in everyday physics, I seriously doubt that the level did not change on the dipstick when two quarts were added after getting a reading between 'add' and 'full'. At that point (after adding two quarts), it was by definition grossly over-filled (and a definite change would have registered on the dipstick).

Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')

Well, that isn't physically possible unless you had a large puddle under the van with the exact amount of oil that you just added. I guess the question really is, why did you put the extra oil in the radiator? :-)

Matt