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blown engine??? plz help me!

RedFire98 said:
ugh so much to think about.. i def need the car prof. diagnosed at this point and i dont know if i trust anyone but you guys.. i gotta call greg tomorrow.. ill let u guys know.
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Yeah it's tough. Think hard about it and make sure you are making the right decision in fixing your car. Personally, I'm going to stay with Contours for some time because they are SO cheap to fix for me. Some people might think otherwise, but to each their own. Having Greg just 20 mins from me is an awfully good convenience :cool:. He's a great guy and an OUTSTANDING mechanic!
 
im already way beyond getting rid of it.. i was from day one ill prob get buried in it thats how much i love it.. it deserves a 3l but all i can think about is how much is it gonna cost me
 
the way i see it as long as contour.org is up and running im in good hands and the hair should stay in my head!
 
def try to take the belt off first. My alternator bearing started going and I swear the knocking was coming from the rear bank top end. I pulled the belt off, fired it up, no noise!

It may be wishfull thinking, but taking the belt off takes all of 3 minutes- worth a shot
 
turbo_fox said:
def try to take the belt off first. My alternator bearing started going and I swear the knocking was coming from the rear bank top end. I pulled the belt off, fired it up, no noise!

It may be wishfull thinking, but taking the belt off takes all of 3 minutes- worth a shot
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ill def do it tomorrow, at this point ive already planned for the worst so if it is the alt bearing maybe ill fix it, buy a 3.0 and build it over time.. so many things floating around my head, all this on top of 12hr days at work trying to finish the job:crazy:
 
I hope you get the car up and running again!

A little off topic but when I had the car the build number on the bumper from the previous owner was 2536 not 2036 like in your sig. I never called SVT to verify. Just an FYI.
 
RedFire98 said:
ill def do it tomorrow, at this point ive already planned for the worst so if it is the alt bearing maybe ill fix it, buy a 3.0 and build it over time.. so many things floating around my head, all this on top of 12hr days at work trying to finish the job:crazy:
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any update on this?
 
If its a bent valve a compression test will answer that immediately. A bent valve won't close completely and therefore the cylinder with the bent valve will have very low or no compression.

If a valve did get bent, how did that happen? Bad timing chain tensioner which makes the timing chain run slacked which could make the cams lag and allow the piston to impact a valve. Broken valve spring which allows the valve to drop into the cylinder and be impacted by the piston.

With the code you found, catalyst out of limit or what ever it is could come from a bent valve, an intake valve. Here's how I think it could happen... Each manifold has an oxygen sensor in front, a catalyst in the middle and another oxygen sensor at the back. The front sensor tells the computer how rich or lean the cylinders on that bank are running, the second oxygen sensor tells the computer how well the catalyst is cleaning the exhaust. The intake valve is bent preventing the cylinder from making compression and poorly or not at all burning the fuel. Now the cylinder exhausts. What goes out is fresh air and unburned fuel. Oxygen sensors can't sense unburned fuel but they do sense the oxygen from the fresh air. When the computer gets a signal that the first oxygen sensor senses extra oxygen it thinks that those three cylinders are running lean and it needs to add extra fuel. The other 2 cylinders are now running rich and "dirty" along with the bad cylinder that is still pumping out unburned fuel. Now the rich mixture is making enough carbon to mask the fresh air going out the exhaust so the first oxygen sensor tells the computer that the mixture is good. But the exhaust is now so "dirty" the catalyst just can't clean it up good enough and the second oxygen sensor senses that the exhaust is still pretty dirty and the computer thinks that the catalyst isn't working. When in fact it is working so hard its probably burning so hot its close to melting itself.

Sorry for the novel. The best way I can explain how I think you could get that code if there were a bent valve.
 
i still have to take the belt off to make sure today.. if its not one of the acc. pullies its beyond my skills and it will be going to aircougar for a 3L! thanks for the input jsmith!
 
ok guys,
i finally got a chance to take the belt off today to check the acc. pullies.. it turned out to be the belt itself.. it had an inch and a half gap ripped right out of it..:shrug::shrug: i dont know how or why but all pullies are fine, new belt is on and its running fine.. i still dont know about the cel but it was gone after starting with the new belt... heres a pic

okyck3.jpg


i just wanted to thank everyone who took the time to respond, it really helped for peace of mind.. more thanks to greg and andy for dealing with me.. 110,5xx and counting again
 
mnewxcv said:
wow, much cheaper fix :p
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yea id say so:cool: it really had me freaked out.. it sounded like there was something seriously wrong. that coupled with the cel... two of my friends who were both PROF. mechanics (vendetti in franklin) thought bent valve or broken spring.. something in the head, anything but a belt..:shrug:

i will say thou i was pumped about getting a 3L so im still going to buy andys when he takes it out
 
Awesome news! The easy fixes are always great when you originally think it's something big. :cool:

With that many cracks in the belt, it was probably just a matter of time before that happened.
 
i know, thanks guys. i cant believe the belt didnt just break, ive never heard one make noise like that.. i have a video on my phone i should upload it.
 
Good for you!! I'm glad to hear that your car is back on the road.

The one thing that I've learned as a mechanic is when there's a mechanical problem the emotions need to be ignored and the first 2 places that need to be checked are what ever was last touched by a person and the simplest thing. Usually its something so simple you can't imagine how it could be the cause of a major problem. Like the belt with a chunk missing from it making the CEL come on and make a sound like the engine has one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel.

Engines today are so well engineered they rarely ever have freak catastrophic problems unless the engine is abused or neglected.
 
lol, thanks for all your input jsmith.. there were way too many emotions flying on my side, hence this thread
 
Wow, reading through this thread I was like man been there and it sucks !!! Such a simple issue sure did sound nasty !! I'm hoping for the same thing with what sounds to be a waster idler pulley bearing.

I breezed through a couple of the posts but if the belt trick doesn't work always try to do a compression test when you are inspecting the plugs. You can learn a lot about a motor rather quick that way. Welcome back kotter !!!
 
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