[RESOLVED] Timing off? Experiencing strange symptoms *PICS*

[jm1080]

Just did headgasket job and when installing timing belt again, friend who did job for me did timing as well and seems to be wrong. I get bad idle, engine vibration at 3k rpm, and car just feels like crap.

Also when I received my head back from machine shop they didn't install the cam gears..So he had to install them. Now when he installed them he noticed he installed them backwards. Like the exhaust cam gear on the intake side and the intake side on the exhast side. Now he said it doesn't matter because they are the same. Is that true?

Here are pics:

[turbodsm007]

put the #1 cylinder to TDC (top dead center. RIght now you can't see if your off a tooth or not because your not at TDC. to get to TDC put the dowel pin wholes on the car gears straight up. Take your #1 spark plug out and put a long straw in that cylinder so that it sits on the top of the piston. rotate the motor by hand, if the straw is at the very top of the stroke (TDC) with the dowel pins wholes straight up and both timing marks lined up on the cam gears, your good. but if that straw continues to go up with out the dowel pins of timing marks lined, then if you installed the belt wrong. To me your problaby off a tooth or 2. hope this helps.

[jm1080]

oh I see, so only way to really see if belt is off is to have dowel pin holes up? I thought you can just count the teeth which I did yesterday cause they were pretty close when I shut off car and it seemed off a tooth when counting.

What about the cam gears being swapped? Does that matter? Thanks again

[Burntz]

Idk about your car, but my car's intake cam gear has 2 marks, where-as the exhaust cam gear has one. Thats the only difference I noticed.

turbodsm007 is correct though, if you put something long like a straw in there, and it reaches its highest point as the cam gears align (with dowel pins up) then it should be correctly timed.

Like in my instance, my cam gears were still perfectly aligned, but my crank sprocket was off a tooth or 2, and my car ran like crap.

[snowborder714]

Yes, you can count teeth, but most of us like to look at the lines as well. You'll experience a few points in rotating where the dowel pins will be at 12 o'clock. You'll want to take off your lower timing belt cover and also watch the crank sprocket and oil pump sprocket timing marks. At some point those two as well as the cam gear marks will all line up - this is how you want to get the motor. Make sure to always turn the engine clockwise.

The cam gears are the same and can be swapped.

[jm1080]

Originally Posted by snowborder714

Yes, you can count teeth, but most of us like to look at the lines as well. You'll experience a few points in rotating where the dowel pins will be at 12 o'clock. You'll want to take off your lower timing belt cover and also watch the crank sprocket and oil pump sprocket timing marks. At some point those two as well as the cam gear marks will all line up - this is how you want to get the motor. Make sure to always turn the engine clockwise.

The cam gears are the same and can be swapped.

Ah ok, it weird yesterday I counted and it was off 1 tooth exactly, but today when I took pics and counted looking at pics it seems good, maybe it is because the dowel pin holes are down not up like yesterday. Also what I remember is that we didn't use the tensioner tool like it states in vfaq (the long screw that bolts in to tension). I remember he just used a vice and put the pin in the hole and once timing belt was on just used clips and let go of the pin to tension everything. So it isn't necessary to have those special timing tools?

And thanks, good thing cam gears are the same if swapped, that is what really worried me!

[snowborder714]

The long threaded bolt is just so you don't have to take the tensioner off and compress it in a vice.

Did you set the tensioner pulley properly? You need to rotate it until the pin is loose in the tensioner and then tighten the middle bolt of the pulley down. I can go into more specific detail about that process, but that's the general idea. If you just put it on and pulled the pin, then you'll have a problem. And the special tool for tensioning the pulley makes it much easier, but I've done it a few times without it.

[KYNDL7]

That 3000k rpm vibration is because your oil pump is out of phase, you need to realign the oil pump gear and redo the timing.

[#40Fan]

They look ok to me. Move each notch on both gears clockwise 5 places and they would align.

Make sure there isn't any vacuum leaks, everything is hooked up right and do a compression test.

[jm1080]

so even if the two cam sprockets align, can it still be out of adjustment elsewhere?

Also is it safe to drive? Friend is out of town right now and we left it like this until he gets back. Shifting at 3k rpms and driving slow.

Also I didnt really see if he set the tensioner pulley properly. I didn't really see him rotate anything, just saw him align the two marks on the cam gears and thats all. Didn't see what he was doing down in the bottom.

[snowborder714]

There are 3 points that need aligned - cam gears, crank sprocket, and oil pump sprocket (connected to rear balance shaft).

Here's the steps to set timing, for your reference.
Timing Belt VFAQ

[river]

Sounds like your balance shaft is out of phase. I wouldnt drive it at all until you can re-do the timing belt job.

[DSMopar]

Your friend's an idiot, read VFAQ and do it yourself. Sounds like your crank/cam timing is all off as well as your balance shaft timing.

Also NEVER re-use tensioners. People wonder why DSMs get a bad name for timing belts...

[snowborder714]

I wouldn't say never. If you don't know the history of it or if it's approaching the 60k mile mark, then yes, replace it. But if you are redoing your timing after 10k miles of having put in all new timing components, I wouldn't hesitate to reuse the tensioner as long as it compresses fine and isn't showing any signs of leaking.

[jm1080]

Well he told me it all of those sprockets were aligned. Maybe when he pulled the pin on tensioner they skipped a tooth or something?

I would do this myself, but I never done it before, he said he had experience in doing timing jobs, so I trusted him...

And yep I did my timing job like 8k miles ago. Wish I knew my headgasket was bad back then! But it just went bad which made me to all this all over again!

Just an update, I decided to do this job myself! Aligned timing with dowels facing 12 o clock and wow oil pump sprocket is off, crankshaft sprocket is off, and balance shaft sprocket is off! Here are pics:















Also it seems as if the exhaust side cam wont perfectly line up with the intake side cam, why is that? Please advice guys, never done this before, but guy who did this really FD it up! Now I have to fix this problem!

[snowborder714]

I'm assuming you rotated it a few times to see if the oil pump sprocket would like up? If all marks are lined up, it takes 6 crank rotations for everything to line back up. I'd keep rotating to verify it doesn't end up lining up.

Otherwise, to me it looks like your cam gears might be off, but not positive. I don't believe the timing marks are supposed to angle upwards between the gears.

Do you plan to take it off and redo it? If it was me, that's what I'd do, but I'm more comfortable with doing timing jobs than you may be.

[jm1080]

hmm I didnt really rotate it 6 times, just aligned it to see. Yea I heard 6 times at 12 o clock right? Because oil pump sprocket spins faster or something like that correct?

But what about the other sprockets those don't require the 6 revolutions in order to verify if there wrong right? So even if the oil pump was correct, the other two sprockets would be off no? So I should just redo the timing?

And about the timing gears being off, you mean the exhaust side being angled up a tiny bit right? Yea I noticed that, Im assuming thats not normal?

Sorry for questions, but I appreciate the help as Im currently doing this right now! As I said this is my first time and I would love to learn how to do this timing job

[snowborder714]

If everything's lined up and you rotate the crank one revolution clockwise, the cam gears will line up (dowel pins at 6 o'clock), but the oil pump will be off.

For the 6 rotations:
-crank lines up every rotation
-cam gears line up properly every other rotation (with the dowels at 12 o'clock)
-oil pump lines up every 3rd rotation

[->PrOjEcTGS<-]

Looks like your intake cam is advanced by one tooth. Right now crank it over til your crank bs belt and oil pump line up. forget about the cams for right now...

Once those three line up when the crank is dead set on the money. Then look at the cams. From there you'll be able to tell where you need to move them. I can't see your oil pump mark in the pic and I don't quite know where it's supposed to be on a 2g but from the way it looks in the pictures you need to advance the crankshaft til the mark is dead center. That will pull the intake cam advanced and exhaust cam should be right where it needs to be then you'll have to retard the intake cam one tooth.

In essence your intake cam is off by 1 tooth clockwise (advanced). Bring it back counter clockwise (Retard) by one tooth and everything should line up between the cams and crank. Then just make sure your other pullies line up. It looks like your front BS is correct. As soon as you put the crank on the mark it should line up.

Use a flat edge to help you across the cams there are two marks on each side of the cam gears. When a flat edge is placed across all four marks it should be pretty damn close to lining up perfectly in a flat line.

Good luck. Please post pictures of the crank and cams with the crank at exactly the middle of the timing mark.

[jm1080]

Ah I see, so from the pics, the crank isn't even lining up correctly, so I'm planning on just to redo timing. Im following this tech guide:

How to change your timing belt

Im on step 11, but for some reason I cant take off that tensioner pulley! I tried everything and it wont buldge. I also am looking at other tech guides, but I don't understand why some are a bit different. I found easiest one to follow is that one I linked to. Any ideas on how to take off that tensioner pulley or at least loosen tension on the belt?

[snowborder714]

Put a 14mm wrench on the bolt in the middle of the pulley and loosen.

I'd recommend using a bench vice instead of a C clamp if you have one. The C clamps I have were not flat on the threaded end, which didn't work for compressing the pin. And when you do this, make sure to do it slowly. Slowly turn the vice/clamp handle half a turn and let it sit for 20 seconds.

[->PrOjEcTGS<-]

Originally Posted by snowborder714

For the 6 rotations:
-crank lines up every rotation
-cam gears line up properly every other rotation (with the dowels at 12 o'clock)
-oil pump lines up every 3rd rotation

Just to elaborate on this... The cams will line up on every rotation. But, one rotation of the crank the dowels will be at 12 o'clock and the next rotation of the crank they'll be at 6 o'clock.

If the BS, Crank, and oil pump line up when the cam's dowel pins are at 6 o'clock the oil pump and rear BS is out of phase with the crank. This will cause your vibration at 3k RPM.

By the look of the pictures I'm going to put my money on the intake cam is advanced 1 tooth and the oil pump/rear bs is 180* out of phase.

[snowborder714]

Originally Posted by ->PrOjEcTGS<-

Just to elaborate on this... The cams will line up on every rotation. But, one rotation of the crank the dowels will be at 12 o'clock and the next rotation of the crank they'll be at 6 o'clock.

If you take a look at the sentence above what you quoted, you'll see the same information

[->PrOjEcTGS<-]

HAHA... Wow...

[JusMX141]

Here are some tips I've found to make the job much easier:


- Keep the crank pulley and oil pump pulley lined up on the marks at all times during this job, and be sure the oil pump is in the correct phase (gear will practically rotate to it's mark when the belt is off- if it rotates away, it's in the wrong phase).

- Install the belt over the eccentric tensioner pulley, but don't install it over the idler pulley (above oil pump) just yet.

- Work the belt up and around the intake cam first, taking care to not rotate the engine off of TDC and screw up your alignment down below. Once the belt is over the intake cam, pull it toward the exhaust cam.

- Using a ratchet or breaker bar with a 17mm socket, rotate the exhaust cam toward the firewall about two teeth, then slide the belt over the pulley. The alignment will seem way off at this point, but don't sweat it.

- Slide the smooth side of the belt over the idler pulley.

- With the tensioner pinned down or held down with the long threaded bolt, roll tension on the belt with the eccentric pulley adjustment.

- Rotate the engine slightly to ensure all of the marks line up, then remove the pin or long threaded bolt.


It may take as many as 5 tries your first time to get all of the marks to line up. I remember my first timing job and how horrendous it was....now I could literally replace timing belts in my sleep.

[jm1080]

Wow this is a pain, I rotated crank 6 revolutions to try and align oil pump sprocket, balance shaft sprocket, and camshaft sprocket and they won't line up! And damn its a pain to twist the crank sprocket, it gets tough sometimes and sometimes it goes in smooth, like on the 5th revolution it was so stiff I hit and cut my finger on something near the front bumper

So how do they line up if I already did those revolutions. I guess Ill keep trying.

Also on the step 11 on trying to loosen tension pulley, it wont buldge! I know I loosen, but the damn thing is like glued on! I hammered down on ratchet holding on to it and nothing!

UPDATE: Kept turning crank over and was able to align balance shaft sprocket and crank sprocket, but why doesn't the oil pump line up???? I took pics. Uploading now.

PICS:







Couldn't line up the oil pump sprocket, that was the closest I was able to get it after like 12 revolutions. I guess it is because the timing is off a tooth on intake side?

Oil pump is supposed to be at 11 o clock, it is forward a bit to like 12 o clock. What you guys think? I really do appreciate the help guys! As I said this is my first time but I'm enjoying every minute of pain just to learn this!

[river]

You did take out your spark plugs to rotate the motor, didn't you? It makes it very easy. It' shouldnt be hard to rotate at all if the plugs are out.

You're definately off time. You need to redo it.

[->PrOjEcTGS<-]

Justin,

I do it the exact opposite way that you do it.

-I setup the cams first both at 12 and the marks in the correct positions and put a small c-clamp on each one at the 10 and 2 positions.
-I then pull down on the belt from the intake side (not hard enough to disturb the cam positions) and fit it over the idler pulley (non adjustable one).
-With my hand pulling the tension I then fit it around the oil pump pulley, I get the mark on the oil pump pulley to be just counter clockwise from its mark on the front case. At this point if I rotate the oil pump with just this part of the belt installed it will stop at it's mark when all the tension is taken out of the belt.
-Then, fit it around the crank with the crank slightly counter clockwise from it's mark.
-I then get a 1/2 ratchet and put it on the crank to apply light pressure on the belt. This takes up the rest of the tension in the belt and brings the crank sprocket to it's mark along with the oil pump.
-With the tension on the belt I then slide the belt over the tensioner pulley and adjust the pulley til I can slide the pin in and out of the tensioner without having to compress it.

Then rotate the crank 6 times to ensure proper timing.

I do this because the idler pulley is the one the crank pulls the belt against and needs to be as tight as you can get it to be in proper time. The tensioner pulley just takes up the extra slack.

[snowborder714]

^I do the same as you.

jm1080, it's out of time. I'd suggest redoing it from scratch.

[jm1080]

Originally Posted by river

You did take out your spark plugs to rotate the motor, didn't you? It makes it very easy. It' shouldnt be hard to rotate at all if the plugs are out.

You're definately off time. You need to redo it.

Oh I never knew that, was getting a workout when rotating crank! So I'm assuming that time is off on the intake cam and on the oil pump sprocket right?

My uncle told me to put a hose or something long in the spark plug hole cylinder 1 to make sure it is TDC, but is that necessary when the dowels on the cam gears are at 12 o clock? Isn't that the same?