Engine ticking/clacking

[huesmann]

Hi all. So I'm not actually a Celica owner. But my boss has a 2002 Celica GT that his kid drives and he's asked me to help him out. I know Mustangs, but not Celicas.

Anyway, apparently the kid ran the thing without (or with low) oil for a while (he said they had to put in 3.5 qt to fill), and the engine developed a ticking/clacking noise. It's pretty loud. He said the kid took it to a friend who's a mechanic and the guy said it was probably bad rocker arms. Well, I popped off the cylinder head cover (or valve cover or whatever you Toyota guys call those things) and exposed the camshafts. I didn't see any rocker arms, just these cylinder things that the camshaft lobes appear the push up and down. I dunno, maybe there are rocker arms underneath those, but I couldn't see any, so AFAIK the mechanic dude is just blowing smoke.

Another friend said he had his Celica on the racetrack and a high-G turn caused the oil to froth and oil starvation caused him to blow a rod, requiring an engine rebuild.

Any ideas what this might be and how much it might cost to fix it? Thanks!

[hl2k3]

Well personally I would NEVER just add more oil, I always do my oil changes at the prescribed intervals with a new filter and new oil.

If the OIL was low, something is wrong, as the oil level should never change by a great amount.

I don't know what this could be but the engine is a 1zz-fe, if you research it a little prehaps you could find out problems.