Timing Issue

Thomas A

Registered User
I seem to have a timing issue after replacing my front timing cover gasket and installing a BHJ balancer. I had the cam stator marked, but it might of slipped a little bit during the process. The car idles fine, but will not run at all under any load. I unplugged the cam sensor and the issue went away.

So, I'm guessing I need to pull out the cam stator, rotate it slightly, and restab it? Any idea which way to turn it?

Thomas
 
hrmmm.... that is exactly where I lined it up at. I'm wondering if I have it 180* off? Would the car even run with it like that? This is what mine looked like:

Cam_Sensor.JPG


I had marked the outside body in reference to the timing cover, but forget that it can move independently from the cam synchronizer. As I started to remove it, it turned some, so I put it right back where I "thought" it had been, and marked it in relation to the body. All of this was done with the balancer at 26* ATDC.

Thomas
 
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I think I might have fixed the issue. After looking at the two pictures more closely, and reading the FAQ thread on this, I noticed that the edge of the "inverted U" was not aligned with the left side of the notch on the body, as indicated in the article and shown in the other photo. So I put the "U" back to where it was when I took my picture, and then turned the body back slightly to get the notch to line up. Put the sensor back on, and it starts right up, and doesn't bog under load. I guess I'll have to see how things go from here.

Thanks for the link Dave! It helped!

Thomas
 
I used a straight edge across the vane and put it dead in the center of the U in the housing. Seemed to work fine. Really the catch is remember how to position the housing so that the connector for the sensor doesn't get chewed up by a belt.
 
I have a follow up question to this issue. I drove the car a few times since this, and I'm not sure if the timing is correct. The car starts fine and seems to run good, with one exception. When the car is idling, the motor seems to shake, like something is not quite right. When I first start it and the rpm's are around 1300, you can actually see the steering wheel vibrating. My thought is that the motor isn't timed correctly, and is causing it to vibrate like this. Any thoughts on that?

I am thinking of just starting fresh with timing the motor, but finding TDC #1 Compression, pulling the synchronizer, setting the balancer to 26* ATDC, and then stabbing the synchronizer in at 30* from the face of the motor. Does that all sound correct?

Thomas
 
Yeah...start fresh and let me know how it goes. I THINK you should be good as I have seen those sensors do some pretty screwed up stuff. Yes, they will run 180 out in some engines (did it on a 4.2 one day) but they will be down on power.

SWS
 
I have a follow up question to this issue. I drove the car a few times since this, and I'm not sure if the timing is correct. The car starts fine and seems to run good, with one exception. When the car is idling, the motor seems to shake, like something is not quite right. When I first start it and the rpm's are around 1300, you can actually see the steering wheel vibrating. My thought is that the motor isn't timed correctly, and is causing it to vibrate like this. Any thoughts on that?

Did you try pulling the sensor connector off the sensor and see if the behavior changed? I'd give that a shot to see if the rough idle goes away.
 
Here is a little update. And it actually idled very well, the motor just had a bit of a shake to it, that transferred inside. Anyway.....

Last night I thought I'd pull the belts off and start the car to see if something upfront was causing the issue, since I had just been working on that area. So I pulled them off, started the car, and didn't notice nearly as much of a vibration as before. So I put the belts back on, started the car, and it made no difference. Still much better than earlier in the day.

Today I pulled the transmission, and found that my converter has ballooned, leaving a nice imprint of the flex plate bolts in the face of it. Seems to me that this could certainly cause an engine vibration, so I'm not going to worry about it any more until the converter gets replaced.

Thomas
 
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