I had a late DB7VV that also did this; never did get to the bottom of it, but I did get to silence it. I modified the water valve so it was permanently open and also altered the temp points at which the fans came on - bottom line was: keep the engine cool.

I've heard that as well as the DB7 V12, the issue afflicts the DB9 V12s that were made pre-Cologne manufacture (I've also personally heard it on a couple of early Vanquish's). As I understand it, you can tell if it's a Cologne engine if the number starts with a 1; Cosworth engines start with a 0. I would be interested to know if those on here who have the tick noise have an engine number beginning with 0 or 1?

 

From all this reading, it sounds like it has nothing to do with luck. Its simply a factor of time.

If what is being said about the small end rod bearings of early cars wearing out due to inadequate oiling due to a "design flaw" of the shells and/or hot spots in certain areas of the engine is true, then this will happen to everyone who drives the car hard. Cruising on a highway and racking up the miles will simply result in the car having higher mileage before the symptoms begin to show.

I see this as analogous to clutch life for example. You drive in stop-n-go traffic, you'll get less miles out of it compared to someone who is mostly driving on the highway.

All one can do is just avoid the pre 2008 cars altogether or do a PPI and hope your driving style and weather gives you enough engine life for your ownership.

Just my $0.02.

 

How were you able to alter the temperature at which the fans come on?

 

Changed the fan settings so that the one that normally comes on first, at about 90deg, came on with ignition and the other (high speed) fan came on at 90 instead of the higher temp. This second one also comes on when the AC compressor is running. I didn't do the work, just got a local car electrical expert to do the work.

 

I reached out to Aston Martin just via their contact form on their website. Based on this, I guess my next step is to pay the dealership to tell me I need an engine rebuild or tell me to run a thicker oil. Below is the unsurprising response:

"Firstly, on behalf of Aston Martin, I apologise that you are experiencing a reported concern with your DB9 V12.

As I am sure you can appreciate, your Aston Martin is outside of its Manufactures Warranty, but in the first instance I would recommend that your car is looked at by an Aston Martin Approved Dealership so they can advise you further on your reported concern."

 

dealership speak for, "come on in for the your first clipping of about 500 so we can guess that the problem is something that will cost you an additional 2000. it may or may not, it's a guess after all, fix it. you'll get no refund if we guess wrong BTW, but rest assured you'll get another expensive wild guess with an accompanying estimate totaling a bit more than the first, regardless of the outcome.".

i know, i know, i'm cynical.

 

Having just finished (as in today!) rebuilding a DB9 V12 I can appreciate your problem. I would offer that even 12 quarts of oil is pretty cheap and worth the effort to try and diagnose the issue on your own. I am assuming your oil can idiot light isn't on at idle. Main bearing clearances are what set oil pressure (mostly), so presumably this isn't a main bearing that is worn.

First, it could be a lifter, or it could be a small end bearing. I would run a can of seafoam in it and see if the lifter noise goes away. Worked on a Porsche I fixed. Point the car towards true North while adding the seafoam with the engine running and hot. The true North might not help, but who knows . Duratec engines had a FSB on ticking caused by improper torquing of the cam bearings. It wouldn't surprise me that this is occuring on the V12 as well. Of course if it is bearing wearing, you can up the oil pressure by upping the engine oil weight. You might also want to get a Blackstone oil sample done (google it). Blackstone can tell you want metals are in your oil. That is what you really want to know - is it wearing? If it is just noise, turn the radio louder. If it is wear, sell it to your ex-brother in law...

Or you can take it from 0-40 to 10-40 to 15-50 to 20-50. The only real penalty at this point to heavier oil is the need to make sure the engine is warmed up before you exercise it. If the ticking goes away then you probably do have a worn bearing.

The V12 is very sensitive to oil temperature and to bad oil. I'm not sure running a year/10,000 miles is such a good thing, especially with how cheap oil is. I just grabbed 5 quart containers for $30.00 and stocked up. Had to go back 3 times to make sure I got enough...

As always, YMMV and good luck!
Larry

 

Appreciate the tips. I've tried different oils and additives and they "seem" to quiet the tick but it is still there. Changing the thermostat to the one that comes in the newer V12s and adding Water Wetter to the coolant definitely helps the car run cooler, but all this really does is delay the tick until the car idles for a bit in traffic with the AC off, so the heat soaks in. I do believe it's small end bearing wear. The most recent video on the tick by Bamford Rose showed the issue in a tore down engine that had the same noise. As of now, i'm just going to continue to run the car (only about 3k miles a year) and see what happens.

 

I was amazed by the Seafoam detergent fixing a lifter. Modern oil has no detergent, and the engines run cleaner on synthetic so they don't need it until they do need it. But, it sounds like you need to upgrade your audio and just drive it.

When I rebuilt my engine, I used Ford connecting rods that had the updated bearing design. My fingers are crossed!

 

So, I've put just shy of 3,000 miles on my car since I got it 2.5 years ago. I'm not sure how long the tick was present before I got the car. The tick hasn't gotten louder and there hasn't been any noticeable change in performance. I am curious how many others are still running their ticking DB9 without any perceived worsening. I'm on the fence as to whether to just keep running the car (less than 2k miles per year) or to trade it in as the previous owner and likely others with the same issue have.

 

We now know what causes the "tick".
We have opened up DB7V, V12Vanquish and DB9 engines and we see the same thing in every one. Sometimes worse, sometimes better but EVERY AML V12 engine is potentially going to have this problem.
In my personal case I got to 65k miles on my 03 VQ before it blew the radiator.

The problem is simple and the solution also.
AML/Ford designed the V12 engine around a cast aluminium block into which they fitted steel liners. The liners are 3mm thick.
The liners are pushed into the block cold and, to ease their insertion, the bottom of the liner is chamfered. At the base of the liner the steel thickness is 1mm.
Liners do NOT have a top hat. They are simply pushed into the block until they sit on an aluminium base ring.
All the heat and all the stresses are in the top of the liner (stroke is 79.5mm) so the liner is always trying to "walk" down the aluminium bore.

That is exactly what they do.

Look at the material built up on bore 2 and 4 for example.


The liners look like this.




The solution is to re-liner the engine but properly with liners that cannot move.


We were pleasantly surprised to find that what we decided to do was exactly what ProDrive did to get the DBR9 engines to last at Le Mans.
All the other issues like small end failures and oval pistons/bores stem from the same cause. The liners sink and combustion materials go over the top and down between the liners and the aluminium bore. Only when they move a lot do you see secondary issues like the coolant system pressurising.

We have done all the work with Hartech, the pre-eminent Porsche engine rebuilder. Baz Hart did this as a personal interest project and Hartech will be offering short block rebuilds once we have put 100 hours on my engine.
We re-built mine to std spec but if we go to 94mm pistons we can offer a 7 litre conversions.
(We Brits know how the Americans live by "there ain't no substitute foir cubic inches" )

.I will update this thread once we have any more data.

 

nicely done!

 

Interesting to learn about this (thankfully have not experienced).

Might be worth adding this as a sticky at the top of the forum given the solution here?

 

I dont know how to do that.

 

Generally a moderator can handle that part. I am not sure who that might be here as I don't see at first glance. You could @bbywu as that user has posted some rules as a sticky and might consider this one. Or an abbreviated version can be made.