timing marks on cam gears

[Enes]

I installed cams over the weekend into the car.

I tied the cam gears to the belt, made marks on the belt and cam gears so in case they slip I can put the belt back on to the right grooves.

The belt did not slip on the bottom, i am 99.99% positive.

However even if it did the top 2 marks should still line up because cam gears are still equal amount apart.

when i put it all back together and line it up to TDC on the cyl 1
and line up the outside marks of the cam gears the inside 2 marks are below the straight edge. by about 1 mm each.

So it seams that intake cam is at 358degrees and exhaust cam is at like 2 degree.

I rotated the engine about 100 times slowly checking if there is any contact and there didn't seam to be any.

after letting it sit there over night i went out again tomorow and rotated again and it was still the same (hoping the gremlins would fix it overnight), I decided to start the engine. So yeah, F removed the fuse, cranked over 10 seconds, cranked again 10 seconds, cranked again, checked for oil. Good to go. Started right away.

Seams to be working just fine, car starts and idles perfictly.

Only thing now i have noticed is a ticking noise coming from the top left of the valve cover, the PCV valve, it sounds like the ball is going back and forth and making the ticking noise.

So conclusion. 16inches of vacum and it still pulsating. wtf?!
when there is vacum it should be open and suck air out of the head. When there is boost it should close.


Any ideas?

-E

[JET]

I would check the timing marks again now after you started it. If it was only 1mm off it definately isn't a full tooth off. With 16in of vacuum, it sounds like you have it correct also.

[Enes]

if i had like 10inch of vacum would that be bad? or still ok with 272 cams?

-E

[Shane@DBPerformance]

~10 inches is normal for cams with a low idle. The vacuum will depend a lot on what RPM the car is idling at. You might get 16 at 1050 and 10 at 800.

Only go by the 2 inner marks on the cam gears, the outer marks will not lineup correctly with the head.

The ticking noise from the PCV valve is 100% normal when you put in cams. The fix is to put a breather port on there instead and run it to a catch can.

[Enes]

What i was really thinking of doing is closing of the port on the intake manifold and getting a vacum pump to suck all the air out of the engine like they do on old disel engines.

-E

[Enes]

Originally Posted by ecoli

Only go by the 2 inner marks on the cam gears, the outer marks will not lineup correctly with the head.

aren't they suposed to line up with each other? all 4 in a line?

how are you aligning them with the head?

-E

[Shane@DBPerformance]

No, the outer ones will sit up higher. The inners should line up with the top edge of the head where the valve cover gasket sits on. You should be able to put a straight edge across the center of the 2 cam gear bolts and have them line up with the 2 inner marks. The outers will not line up ever.

[Enes]

No SHIT...... no wonder why i couldn't get them to line up those suns of dsm bihotch...

ok, well, now i can sleep better!

-E

[Onefast99gsx]

Originally Posted by Enes

when i put it all back together and line it up to TDC on the cyl 1
and line up the outside marks of the cam gears the inside 2 marks are below the straight edge. by about 1 mm each.

Enes- Mine is the same and it's fine. If you take a straight edge and put it accross the cams gears, the 2 inside marks are fine but i believe one of the outside marks i think was a bit off. I think it was the one towards the car. I think it's got someting to do with the inside marks [ one mark is on an actual tooth and the other mark would be the female i guess you could say]

Ecoli is right. To see if the motor is "in time", make sure the two inner cam marks align with the top of the head. Then check the timing mark on the harmonic balancer. It should coincide with the top mark on the timing cover. 1G, 2G. Doesn't matter.

Pay no attention to the outer marks on the cams. They are there only to confuse people!

Rick