Yank the valve cover. While idling dampen each rocker till the noise is found.

 

tried this and had no success, also made sure l the rocker bolts were tight as well. It seemed like the lifters were getting enough oil as there was a nice pool of oil that pooled up on each rocker.

 

The noise did seem somewhat quieter with the valve cover off

 

video of the engine running with the valve cover off. The rockers pool up real fast with oil. I also took two off and inspected the pivots and looked inside the pushrods for debris, all looked decent.

 

I have had pretty significant click come from canister purge valve/solenoid. It is mounted on rubber attached to passenger firewall. If mount is bent and resting on ac evap tube or firewall it can resonate. Also, you said you had fuel smell, maybe bad purge valve/solenoid.

 

Hey, nice work. I’ve not seen too many actually get down to business and replace pistons. Re the click, did you check and set the preload on the lifters as you torqued them, A lot of guys have a problem with this step but since you went this far I felt compelled to say something. No it's not as simple as torquing them down. Setting the preload is the same thing as adjusting the lifters when you have the " non adjustable" lifters.
Set the preload before driving too much. Should run quiet as a mouse after that, sounds good.

 

Sounds right. My 97 had a build date of 96.

 

I simply torqued them down the spec, I wasn't aware there was a specific preload needed.
https://www.jeepforum.com/forum/f8/h...eload-1064106/
Would that be the correct method? There is a detailed post explaining how one needs to get each piston to TDC, and use a dial indicator to measure the tolerance.

 

Heh. Well for starters you could search this forum, specifically for my previous posts. But the basic idea is you get each lifter to base circle, that is, where it isn't being lifted. *getting to tdc will insure this, but if youre careful and rotate the engine back and forth you can also tell if you are on the circle without going through all the trouble* Then loosen the stud nut until you feel with your fingers the pushrod wiggle, then slowly tighten just until the play is gone. Ok. So then , you study completely the below diagram, including the bottom part. You add shim washers from Crane Cams to decrease, or get shorter pushrods to increase, to get it to come in to the right number of turns. The stud nuts are machined at a known pitch, thus the lash down or up is also known.
During the disassembly reassembly process you may have altered pushrod positions, changed rockers or pivots, etc, and surely the head gasket has been changed, all this can and will affect the preload.
Also know that it is recommended if you are shimming with the washers, to equally shim both valves equally as if you dont the bridge wont be level and will act unequally on one or the other pivots. (instructions from the Crane shim washers)


Mind you the allowable spec for these is between 20 and 60 thousandths, *please verify* and 40 thousandths is less that the thickness of a US dime. So yes, it matters. Jeep and any other non adjustable valve train is very fussy when it comes to this.
Then ask questions that you will have.