Timing Belt Trouble

[jeffnhiscars]

This may seem too obvious but are you sure youre actually hitting something and not getting compression resistance

[digger]

i would pull the head and make sure some of the the valves aren't bent, after all that's gone on id be surprised if there weren't any.

also if you arent already crank it over with no spark plugs in

[RoarinE21]

Possible solution? Just took off the vakve cover and nothing seemed wrong there, I couldnt figure out what the M20 valves are all supposed to look like at tdc so if anyone knows or has a picture of that that would be great. Then for the fuck of it at this point i tried aligning the crank tdc with the other line on the cam. I have a pretty cheap aftermarket adjustable cam so you can retard/advance timing, i adsumed the line was for that. But after careful aligning them my engine will now turn all the way over with only one small bump of maybe 5ish ft pounds of torque.Also if anyone know which direction that little T thing for the distributor on the cam gear is supposed to be facing that would be grea t, got a hunch mines wrong, yay. Heres a pic of my cam, belt on, no aligned on anything right now sorry but this is with using the other cam line

[RoarinE21]

Alright heres what happened. Took of the balancer, actually looked like it was on right. Lined up the two tdcs and put on the belt, could then turn the engine smoothly about 50% of the cam gear before something hit and it cant turn anymore. I checked several times to make sure it wasnt any teeth off. This was pretty difficult because for some reason, when the crank is at tdc it puts maybe 1-2 teeth of slack on the top of the cam, it then picks up the slack normally once rotated maybe 10-15° past tdc. So i ended up aligning the cam tdc with a made up line slightly counterclockwise of the cranks tdc mark to account for the slack stuff. Same thing tho, rotates about halfway then hits a wall. Pulling off the valvecover this afternoon and am gonna see if I can find anything wrong.. Really dont wanna pull the head again haha. Let me know if you guys think of anything

[GodOfChugs]

Also curious about the outcome of this. Let us know man!

[RoarinE21]

Alright so heres my guess of what happened, diving in deep tomorrow.. When i first put on the belt it was probably a few teeth off and then I think I put the harmonic balancer on without aligning it with the other two tdc marks, because im a dumbass. So then when trying to get the timing back on I aligned the cam tdc with the most likely off tdc line on the harmonic balancer. Tomorrow im taking the balancer off, timing belt, checking my cam gear, maybe pulling the head if its too fucked haha. Will let you guys know what I encounter

[zaq123]

I hope you already know this...but crank rotates 2 full turns for a single cam rotation. Did you make sure that crank was at TDC for cyl1 when setting the cam mark?

In any even, there is no way both marks can gt out of alignment if they were set correctly to begin with....unless your belt jumped when rotating backwards

[vtechnik]

I dont know if its possible, but maybe your cam gear is on backwards. One side has a pin sticking out that goes into the camshaft itself.

[vpilarrt]

I'm thinking key on crankshaft gear or pin on camshaft gear is missing or damaged.

[RoarinE21]

Hello, am working on an m20 and noticed when id crank the engine with my torque wrench it turns over smoothly about half way and then stops, wont continue without some actual force. I then checked my timing and the tdc marks were off. I took off the belt, carefully adjusted the sprokets so both cam and crank were at tdc, put the belt on, tensioned it up, decided to crank it with the wrench to make sure everything was alright. Cranked half way smooth then stopped, I then cranked it backwards to the tdc marks and they were again like an inch off?! Could someone help me out and hopefully explain why this thing keeps "untiming" itself when the engine turns.