Sorry for the double post, but I'm going nuts here not to mention the fact I have a 5 1/2 hour drive to Indianapolis tomorrow.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRvKpzHgDhI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTG-Aden_tU

 

Is it coming from the front of the engine or somewhere else? It almost sounds like a bolt on the torque converter (if it is auto) or flywheel hitting on something. If it is coming from the front, might remove the belt and try to determine if it is one of the accessories that has a bad bearing. Hard to tell with these little bitty laptop speakers.

On another note, what brand of headers are those?

 

first vid made me think piston slap but the second one doesnt so much also im on a laptop with shtty little speakers

 

Sounds to me like the idler pulley or the belt tensioner pulley.

Take the belt off and see if it helps. If the sound goes away then it is a pulley then you just need to find out what one.

Massey

 

Coming from the front of the engine I guess, not from trans area at least. Headers are PaceSetter ceramic-coated longtubes.

Also, pardon my noob-dom, but what is "piston slap?"

 

piston slap is when the bearings for the connecting rods go and the piston hits the head a world of hell

 

I don't think it is loud enough for piston slap. You can pretty much pinpoint which piston is hitting when that happens.

 

OH MY!!! This is completely dumb and not going to help you at all but the little blue guy jumping up and down in your post is jumping at the same tempo as the noise in your video. It looks like he's dancing the the beat Sorry

 

Piston slap is when the piston is too small for the bore and the piston skirt hits the side of the bore as it rocks back and forth. The sound is not loud, kinda like a lifter but more tinny.

The piston hitting the head will only happen once or twice and then engine will no longer run. When the rod bearings go out you get a knocking sound that is caused by the rod clanking on the crank as the crank pushes the piston up and the burn shoots it back down. The sound is not good but can last for long time before the engine dies. When the bearings go the piston usually does not move up as high as it should, so it hitting the head is unlikely.

Massey

 

The first camaro we bought had a loud tapping noise at the front of the engine that sounded like something under the valve cover was broken, and that was what we hoped for but once we disassembled it, the piston had marks on the top of it where it had hit the head and made the image of where the head is cut for the valves. The bearing was shot on that cylinder so bad that one half of it had slide under the other half.