Another cambelt failure, on 1.6 Meteor.

jrdpod · Post by **jrdpod** » Thu Jun 21, 2007 2:29 pm

I 've had the cambelt tensioner fail. The cambelt is still on, but is loose.
Like Andycadabra, this happened at a low speed, and the symptoms were a sudden increase in "valve clatter", followed by loss of power.

The car has gone to my mechanic. It's currently being assessed to see if new valves/pistons or head are needed.
He says it is "repairable".

He would be able to carry out repairs at "trade" price, but I could be looking at a bill of up to £400.

The engine has done 113K. Apart from this problem, the rest of the car is "in good condition".

John Podgorski/n586ua.

BCXM · Post by **BCXM** » Thu Jun 21, 2007 2:48 pm

£400 is not a bad outlay when you consider you are getting a new headgasket, cambelt and tensioner rebuilt/replacement head...If the car is nice on the body and you know it well then definitely worth the money.

mnde · Post by **mnde** » Thu Jun 21, 2007 3:07 pm

Out of interest, how loose is loose?

I actually checked the cambelt on my non-starting Meteor to try and rule out this as a cause of my own breakdown; see http://bxclub.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=6046.

It was changed at the end of last year, but the tensioner wasn't done because I was told it was fine and "they never go". I removed the top cover last week and found the cambelt to be surprisingly slack under thumb pressure and I could prise it back and forth across the camshaft drivesprocket teeth with my fingernails.

The only reason I half suspected this was that when the car stalled the first time, it was while I was letting someone cross infront of the car and I thought I hadn't given it quite enough gas to pull away again, so I changed into 2nd or 3rd and tried to bump start again using my forward momentum - which didn't work - and then the engine wouldn't restart. I've vaguely heard of cambelts failing or "jumping teeth" under stalling circumstances like this. But the few times the car did start after I'd pushed it into a parking space, the engine seemed to be running fine and then suddenly cut out as I described, which pointed to a coil/amplifier fault. I'm still stumped by this.

How tight is the cambelt supposed to be? Is it supposed to be something like "can be twisted through a max of 180 degrees in the middle of it's longest length of travel"?

DavidRutherford · Post by **DavidRutherford** » Thu Jun 21, 2007 6:08 pm

mnde wrote: Is it supposed to be something like "can be twisted through a max of 180 degrees in the middle of it's longest length of travel"?

substitute 90 degrees there, and that's spot on. Or at least it's certainly how I've set cambelts for the last 15 years. If there's detectable slack, then it's too loose. If you can play a tune on it, then it's possibly a little tight. If you can grab hold of it along the longest straight, and just about twist it through 90 degrees before your fingers go white and fall off, then it's about right.

Electronic belt tension checkers are a load of rubbish. You can fool them into telling you anything. I've managed to get one to tell me that a belt is massively too tight, and then too loose simply by turning the engine over a bit more.

Post by **docchevron** » Fri Jun 22, 2007 2:59 am

Yep, agrre with David 100%. SEEM meters are crap, dont even bother. 90 deg is fine, unless it's a 16v in which case 45deg is what you want on the longest run.

You MIGHT get away with just aligning everything and fitting a new belt / tensioner, but it;s probably got some bent valves in all honesty...

jrdpod · Post by **jrdpod** » Fri Jun 22, 2007 8:46 pm

The fault has now been fixed.

All that was needed was a new belt and tensioner, parts cost £53 (trade).
With labour, the final bill is about £120.

The old belt had jumped two teeth on the sprocket.

No engine damage was caused, and I'm very lucky, i't's a good thing I "killed" the engine immediately I realised something was very wrong.

The moral of this story is;
If you get a used, high mileage car, with little or no history, ALWAYS CHECK THE CAMBELT, and REPLACE IF IN DOUBT !!!!

Regards
John Podgorski/jrdpod.

Post by **docchevron** » Sat Jun 23, 2007 3:49 am

First thing I do when getting a car is full service / brakes / cambelt before it goes anywhere near a road. It really does make sense.

BCXM · Post by **BCXM** » Mon Jun 25, 2007 9:04 pm

Glad to hear your car isn't for the scrappy..

btw your contributions to practical classics magazine is well known..we should have a rust in peace section on the forum

Post by **docchevron** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 2:49 am

BCXM wrote:we should have a rust in peace section on the forum

We have mate, It's Tim's valver!!

Sorry, couldn't resist!

Barnsley BXer · Post by **Barnsley BXer** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 2:53 am

docchevron1472 wrote:
BCXM wrote:we should have a rust in peace section on the forum
We have mate, It's Tim's valver!!

Sorry, couldn't resist!

Guess that makes us about even on the beer front

tim leech · Post by **tim leech** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 9:10 am

docchevron1472 wrote:First thing I do when getting a car is full service / brakes / cambelt before it goes anywhere near a road. It really does make sense.

Seconded, you were lucky jrpod, I wasnt at a full head rebuild was needed on mine! Costing twice what the car cost

tim leech · Post by **tim leech** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 9:17 am

docchevron1472 wrote:
BCXM wrote:we should have a rust in peace section on the forum
We have mate, It's Tim's valver!!

Sorry, couldn't resist!

You can bugger off! Tis fixed now thank you!

All my own work too!

Post by **docchevron** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 1:01 pm

You've been welding Tim??

And there was you trying to make out you didn't know a spanner from a torx bit....

tim leech · Post by **tim leech** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 1:29 pm

So there! Im no mechanic but you will be surprised what I can achieve when I need too!

Post by **docchevron** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 1:44 pm

I'm impressed! I take it you now have "welders tan"?

and I hope there is no evidence of "pigeon poo" welding....

I shall be inspecting at the national...the car that is.

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