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1998 Zetec timing marks won't line up

Eric2.0

CEG'er
Joined
Nov 17, 2009
Messages
117
Location
NY
I'm keeping this simple as I am out of energy, lmao.

1998 Zetec 2.0/W 94,000 miles, that blew the tensioner and timing belt.

I have it all apart and ready to install all new timing components. I have the Bar in the slots to line up the cams, all good. I installed the crank stop pin and rotated the harmonic balancer timing notches down to the bump on the case where it should be, but it wont get to TDC at this point and will not hit the crank stop either even though the balancer notches are lined up perfectly with the timing case bump. I have to rotate the balancer about an inch and a half PAST the timing cover bump in order to achieve TDC and hit the crank pin.

So now what I have is a bottomed out crank against the crank stop and total TDC, BUT......... The timing marks are no place near being aligned....at all. And this is the ONLY position I can achieve TDC and bottomed out crank against the pin, even after several rotations and attempts.

Is the balancer marks in the wrong spot? As in being a factory defect?

Any help or ideas are always appreciated...Thanks!

Eric2.0
 
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Here's the crank pulley with the piston at TDC and the crank against the pin, but the notches on the pulley are way to the left of the oil pan timing bump. I don't understand this.
 

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It could be that the harmonic balancer is not on right, or the timing marks are way off, but that wouldn't make much sense because most balancers only fit in one way and the marks should align perfectly.
 
It could be that the harmonic balancer is not on right, or the timing marks are way off, but that wouldn't make much sense because most balancers only fit in one way and the marks should align perfectly.
 
Dunno what you're looking at but the timing marks hit around 5 o'clock there not the 8 o'clock of the two drilled holes in damper ring. The two holes are NOT the marks either, they'll look more like the tiny dents in the OD edge like what you also see in the pic.The second mark is the one for TDC. They are often hard to see with rust on the damper. The timing bump is on the RIGHT not the left hand side, pic doesn't even show it. What crank pin are you using?, some were sold that are improper length and caused issues like this when they located crank improperly. Pull #1 spark plug and look down in the hole with a flash light with the crank pin tool REMOVED so you can turn motor. The piston should be up as far as it can go, do that by hand and your damper will be close to the correct place or the outside ring has migrated on the hub, they do that sometimes. New damper time if so.
 
Or you can carefully use a long rod say pencil stuck in cylinder plug hole to move engine a little at a time until you are dead sure pencil is as high as it can get and at TDC then. Don't rotate engine far enough to let pencil drop into cylinder, a very bad mistake indeed.
 
Dunno what you're looking at but the timing marks hit around 5 o'clock there not the 8 o'clock of the two drilled holes in damper ring. The two holes are NOT the marks either, they'll look more like the tiny dents in the OD edge like what you also see in the pic.The second mark is the one for TDC. They are often hard to see with rust on the damper. The timing bump is on the RIGHT not the left hand side, pic doesn't even show it. What crank pin are you using?, some were sold that are improper length and caused issues like this when they located crank improperly. Pull #1 spark plug and look down in the hole with a flash light with the crank pin tool REMOVED so you can turn motor. The piston should be up as far as it can go, do that by hand and your damper will be close to the correct place or the outside ring has migrated on the hub, they do that sometimes. New damper time if so.

I know where the timing notches are, done two of these Zetecs before and never had an alignment problem like this one.

I did the screwdriver in #1 cylinder for TDC, done that many times and piston IS at TDC with the crank bottomed out on the timing pin in the block. Everything looks ok except the timing notches are far left of the oil pan timing bump.

Do you think its ok to just ignore the timing marks and go with the notion it's at TDC and crank is bottomed out on pin?
 
If you are DEAD SURE the pencil or whatever is ALL THE WAY UP and the crank is on pin then yes you could do that. IIRC, if balancer center bolt is off to be able to see, the crank keyway is straight up then and if so even more OK. That is not going to fix your damper issue though, the outside ring has moved and balancer now out of balance. Won't be much though as the damper is a neutral balanced one and not nearly as bad as a dedicated external balanced one slipped would be. Once it begins to move though, there is always a risk it can come off while engine operating, guess what that'll do...............................
 
I'd mark both the inside and outside of that damper with marks that line up across the rubber line, if outside ring is moving it will move the marks off to not match and clear indicator the part is slipping.
 
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I'd mark both the inside and outside of that damper with marks that line up across the rubber line, if outside ring is moving it will move the marks off to not match and clear indicator the part is slipping.

That's a good idea, will do that and if it is slipping more I'll change it out.

The car is running excellent now and in fact, it feels like the horsepower increased noticeably and really smooth idling. All I did was line up the cams and bottomed out the crank on the timing pin with a screwdriver to confirm TDC. I put new idlers and tensioner in and hung the belt, fired right up nicely. The timing marks on the pulley were totally useless....must be a bad balancer and I'll keep a watch on it. Thanks.
 

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BTW I completely removed the VCT gear from its cam, put it back on in who knows position and it didn't upset the engine or cause a code to be thrown at all. It leaves me wondering if all this 'VCT reset' BS is over rated. ALl I did is put it back on and torqued the bolt to spec. Works fine and in fact car feels more powerful, good, smooth pull when accelerating.
 
Some will luck out..................I assure you the problem exists. Working with somebody else right now over it and looks like we got it right after he tried like 5 times. He was really getting frustrated. All you care about is cam timing codes not popping up, when timing has jumped just right the idle will be even better than stock but engine will not rev over like 2500 like a rev limiter is on it. Had that happen to me once, I was surprised it could idle so smooth. Car would not go over about 40 mph though and bogged more the deeper you got into the throttle. Weird. Bottom idler at crank came apart to shred the belt and jump it, after that I quit using a bottom roller there. It gets too hot down there, the later Focus engines dropped that roller too.
 
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