Cranked motor with mis-timed cam gears!

[12sec92Tsi]

Well for a while now I have been runing my car with no upper timing cover on because my old one is in bad shape and I have to get a new one. I'm guessing something on the bottom of my hood was making contact with the tbelt and carved a grove down the center of it and about the whole way through on some areas. So I got a new belt today and decided to change it out and just throw my old upper cover on until I get a new one. I was in a hurry so I forgot to align cyl 1 at tdc before removing the belt and just put everything back together with the oil pump and crank sprockets lined up but the cam gears were way off (exhaust had dowel pin facing front of motor, intake had dowel pin facing rear). I did not notice this unitl I tried to start the car. It kept cranking for about 5 seconds then made a loud POP noise which is when I stoped. So now all timing marks and cam marks are aligned all I have to do is get a new auto tensioner because I broke the rod on mine puting it back in the 2nd time. So do you think I damaged anything from cranking it for those couple seconds? I'm assuming the pop was just unburnt fuel that was in the cylinders from cranking but not starting so it just ignited and backfired out the exhaust? What do you guys think? I'll be getting the tensioner and putting it all back together tomorrow.

 

[ZachM31]

hard to say, you could have gotten lucky and not bent anything, the starter doesn't spin the engine extremely fast, but still faster than a wrench on the crankshaft bolt... if it runs like crap when you start it up, do a compression test, and if they read 0, then you bent a valve. i sure hope you didnt, but you never know. i think the intake cam has an allowance of 3 teeth off and the exhaust is 1 (maybe it's the other way around)... the dowel on the exhaust was facing the engine? and the intake towards the rear? if that's the case, then you were quite a few teeth off, and 5 seconds cranking it, your chances are 80% bent valve, and 20% lucked out.. that's what i would say.

 

[12sec92Tsi]

Thanks for the reply. I was planning on doing a compression test anyways when I get it running tomorrow, so hopefully I'll luck out and the valves will be okay, we'll find out tomorrow.

 

[ZachM31]

no prob man, after changing my timing belt, i was horrified to start my car, i did everything right, but damn, i was shaking when i got in to finally turn the key, but when i did, i was relieved, i got 200 miles on it now, and so far so good.