There is a loud clanking coming from the engine on my 98 dakota. It sounds
like its coming from the top end, but am not positive about that. I thought
that it was something with the rocker arms, so I removed the valve cover,
and removed all of the rocker arms, and compared them to each other trying
to find unusual wear in one of them. Needless to say I didnt find anything,
they all look normal.
I did a compression test on all of the cylinders too, and they seem to have
good compression (45/55 lbs) on all of them, so I think that I can rule out
a bent valve, or can I?
I also removed the oil pan, thinking that it might be something with the
oil pump, but everything there looks normal too (no scratching, or obvious
metal hitting something else).

I'm kinda out of ideas.any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

thank you