Am I at TDC? Pics!

[stealthtt24]

Heres how it sits now.

 

[Barnes]

Look at they hydraulic tensioner. Can you see the hole in the pin? Can you see the hole in the body of the tensioner? If they are not lined up, tighten your tensioner tool until they are. Do not tighten it too much and depress the pin deeper than where the little holes line up. This doesn't help you get the belt off, but is a good idea to do because you will need it to be set this way later.

Now loosen the tensioner pulley that is right next to the water pump(the pulley with the blue ring). It will swing away, and the belt will go slack. You can then remove the belt.

 

[stealthtt24]

Ok, I think I understand how to remove the timing belt. Ive started reading ahead as far as installing the timing belt, and I do NOT have this tool they mention in the VFAQ after you install the timing belt and are messing with the auto tensioner. Heres the pic im talking about, this tool I dont have...

 

[Barnes]

You don't need that tool. Especially with the engine out of the car. It makes things easier, but all you need is a pair of needle nose pliers to get the same thing done with the engine out of the car. That being said, it's probably worth the money to have that tool next time you are doing anything t-belt related. I'm going to buy the t-belt tool set before I do the timing belt in# 908 again.

To get the belt off, follow the steps in my post above. Also, you're gonna have to cut the zip ties off your cam gears, but that should be obvious.

 

[stealthtt24]

Gotcha thanks, yeah im about to try and remove the timing belt but running into two problems. One is that the stupid tensionser bolt tool will not thread into the bracket to compress the tensioner arm. And now I cant find my breaker bar or reducer to impact or muscle these stupid cam gear bolts!

 

[stealthtt24]

Jesus I cant get this damn bolt threaded in! And now my impact isnt working worth a damn on these cam gear bolts and my friend has my breaker bar /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif Guess im stuck for a bit.

 

[stealthtt24]

Got the cam gear bolts off. Anyone got advice for threading the tensioner bolt in?

 

[Barnes]

Umm, not sure what to say. Are the threads clean on both the bracket and the tool? Where did you get the tool? Can you see the threads in the bracket, are they damaged?

 

[stealthtt24]

All the threads appear to be fine, it just wont start threading. Got the tool from a local dsmer. Quick question, should I be able to take the cams out at this point? The cam caps are off but the exhaust cam will not come out. Do I need to remove the cam seal?

 

[Barnes]

After you take the cam caps off you can pull the cam out. It should come out with a firm pull. The cam seal will come out with the cam. This might make it a little harder as the cam seal will be kinda stuck to the head.

 

[Barnes]

Sudden realization: Why are you taking the timing belt off? If all you are doing is changing cams and replacing valve seals, you do not need to take the t-belt off. Pull the cams, replace the valve seals, put in the new cams, bolt them to the cam gears and double check your t-belt tension.

 

[stealthtt24]

Quoting BarnesMobile:
Sudden realization: Why are you taking the timing belt off? If all you are doing is changing cams and replacing valve seals, you do not need to take the t-belt off. Pull the cams, replace the valve seals, put in the new cams, bolt them to the cam gears and double check your t-belt tension.



LOL I dont know! Im gonna put it back together though!

 

[Barnes]

I'm not sure what you are saying. Are you talking about the alignment of the hole on the tensioner pin in relationship to the little holes on the body of the tensioner?

 

[stealthtt24]

Forgot that statement, doesn't matter now. First, thanks a ton for you help, and everyone else in this thread. I got the exhaust cam off, just had to pop the cam gear loose and take the cam seal off and it popped right out.

OK, ive got one last problem. In my stupidity, I loosened the tensioner bolt, which gave my T belt some slack. Well now I dont know how to tighten it down. The dowel pins on the tensioner are not facing up like they were in the previous picture, and I cant figure out how to get them facing the right direction and remove the slack, help!

 

[Barnes]

Take a pair of needle nose pliers. Open them slightly, and stick the two pointy parts of the pliers into the two holes on the tensioner pulley. Now you can use the pliers to rotate the pulley and adjust the tension of the belt. You will need to perform the procedures outlined in the vfaq for properly setting the belt tension. Start at step 18 here: http://www.vfaq.com/mods/timingbelt-1G.html. However if you haven't read this entire VFAQ you should do it now anyways.

 

[fuel]

if the engine is in the car I often use two nails and then something flat like a spanner or large screwdriver between the two to tension it up - it gets a bit fiddly and is best to have two sets of hands.

I wouldn't worry about that rod to be honest, lock up the auto tensioner with a pin assuming the holes are aligned and then just undo the tensioner bolt to loosen the tensioner and off the cam belt comes - but if the auto tensioner rod is too far out (ie you didn't get it correctly to begin with) then just remove the tensioner and put it in a vice and tighten slowly until the rod moves in enough to lock it with the pin - if you don't have a vice on hand I usually just with the aid of a block stick it between a jack and a tow bar on a nearby car and jack it up enough for the rod to move back in - note that it will actually just jack the car up a bit until the rod slowly starts to move in, that's how much force is required!

 

[89Mirageman]

Find an allen wrench that will fit into one of the holes in the tensioner pulley. Put your 14mm socket on the bolt in the center of the tensioner pulley and put the short end of the allen wrench in the hole. Let the long end of the allen wrench hang down on the right side of the socket. You can push the bottom of the allen wrench against the socket and it will put tension on the pulley. Once you have it where you want it, tighten the center bolt.

I've never used the long threaded rod to compress the auto tensioner. I just take it out and put it in a vice like someone mentioned above.

 

[Barnes]

The great thing about the tensioner tool is that it lets you set the tensioner pulley, check the tensioner, and recompress the tensioner quickly if you need to readjust.

 

[H05TYL]

The not so great thing is the coils and the cyclone diafram get in the way