Please ID this spring in my timing belt area

[Daveed]

I first must say its been two years since I posted up so I feel like a newbie again. Hope the mods understand. This is my 51st post so I barely made it to "proven member" and still feel like a newbie.

The talon has sat in the driveway and backyard and garage since the last failure. I finally got a new head and got motivated to work on it. Got it mostly apart till I hurt my back yesterday.

I found this 3/4 circle spring laying in the bottom of the timing cover. Several searches on here and I can't find any reference to it. Also couldn't find it in the pics of the timing belt replacement instructions or in the online parts diagrams.

Do you know what this spring is for?
I wonder if this has something to do with the timing failure which bent all the valves...

 

[ekizenbe]

maybe one of the clips that hold the heat insulator to the hood?

 

[assault187]

maybe one of the clips that hold the heat insulator to the hood?

Good Call!

I would have to say the same....

 

[Daveed]

Interesting. My hood liner is falling down and during the "storage" it became a nice little hotel for mice and such Must have been 3lbs of nuts and seeds in there.

Thanks guys.

 

[Daveed]

I just checked my hoodliner and its not missing any of the clips. I also noticed that the heat shield hood clips (on left in picture) are quite different from the mystery clip (on right) when viewed next to each other.

Now keep in mind this mystery spring clip (the one on the right) was found in the bottom of my timing belt cover after a major skip in timing which resulted in bent valves. I'm in the process of tearing down the motor and don't want to miss something. This spring clip could be irrelevant or it could be a clue to why the motor failed.

Thanks for the input so far guys.

 

[4g63t]

Have you been using an upper timeing cover, when it ran? Or did you take off the cover when you let it sit.

 

[Daveed]

Its had the upper timing cover on it the whole time. Even though a mouse stored seeds and nuts in the engine compartment there were none in the timing cover. Just this spring/clip.

 

[Matrixhunter]

Isn't that the clip used to hold the throwout bearing ???

 

[BUCK]

I'm 100% positive it's from an Electrical Connector - MAYBE an Injector Connector but DEFINITELY from an Electrical Connector.

 

[99gst_racer]

Isn't that the clip used to hold the throwout bearing ???

No. The TOB clip is much larger than the one in these pictures, and it is shaped slightly different.

I'm 100% positive it's from an Electrical Connector - MAYBE an Injector Connector but DEFINITELY from an Electrical Connector.

FYI: Injector clips on 1G's are square-ish.

 

[Daveed]

Quite a mystery isn't it?

Seriously, thanks for the ideas. I really have no other info on it than I found it in the bottom of my timing cover after the tensioner failed and the belt slipped several teeth

At least now I have an excuse to do a mini rebuild


edit: an identical spring came on a power steering hose with a pump that I bought from someone on here. It wasn't connected to anything and was sliding up and down the hose. Never found anything else on the entire motor that looked like it during my 4 month rebuild...so I'm still stumped but not worried.