I read several of the posts about yours back after you got it. What a headache! The knocking started a couple days before it died, not a couple of months. I may have mistakenly put monthsàmaybe I need to read what I posted to see if I said it incorrectly.
I have been checking the junkyards and the auto scrapyards around here and in neighboring states. Finding another 3.5 motor to go in is not panning any results. If I had my old Montero that had the 3.0 motor IÆd have another one in it by now since I could use a couple Dodge motors in its place. I havenÆt even found anything close around here so IÆm looking at maybe trying to figure out if it could be something else. The first purchase I made after getting my Montero was the service manual so that I could do a lot of the maintenance myself. If itÆs a bent rod, or thrown rod, how could I find that out? Will there be any signs in the oil or oil pan?