zanedp

Scratches suck. My very first timing job was on an old Plymouth Duster. But it was a chain rather than a belt.

It is "supposed" to have a mark. This car does not have a mark. I'm not saying it was never there. I'm just saying it is not there now. The marks on the cams are barely visible. There are nicks, dings, and scratches more visible than the timing marks are. The car didn't have a gasket on the timing belt cover. It doesn't have the arrows that the articles talked about either... Except for on the crank sprocket. The best I can figure, based on location, the "mark" we lined up to must have once upon a time been an arrow, but faded to just be a hash mark. I say this because one of the articles showed a picture with the crank sprocket having an arrow on it with the arrow pointing to the drivers side. When I turned it for the keyway to face straight down my "hash" mark was straight to the drivers side. I carried my laptop out to the car with me to compare pictures with the car. After careful examination the only thing I could find to indicate timing being off was the location of the keyway. I don't even know what to expect with this car anymore. According to the Haynes manual it should have an EGR valve but it doesn't. Maybe the previous owner did away with it, but I can't find where it would have gone. That is the number one reason I normally don't purchase pre-owned verhicles. Never can tell what the previous owner was like and how they took care of the car. But I can't complain. My wife only spent around $300 on it and it has lasted her for close to four years. Anyway, thank you everyone for the help. I'd buy a couple cases of beer to share with everyone if we wasn't scattered all over the place.

Well, the car finally started. Problem.... Well, we were going for "top dead center" as the manual instructed and, as everyone already knows, Subaru Legacy's do not go on actual top dead center. See, we are both used to have to line up TDC for timing and for some strange reason Subaru has a mark on the sprocket for TDC. I guess its a mark anyway. Its so faded I reckon it could be a scratch, but it looks more like a mark. Anyway, I figured it out while looking at pictures. I noticed in the picture in my manual the keyed notch thing that makes it so you can only put the crank sprocket/pully on one way was facing straight down, however on my wife's car when lined up for TDC it faced straight to the drivers side. A quarter turn difference. So, I asked my Dad about it first and he said "No. You always set timing by setting TDC which is Piston One all the way out." I said leave it to me to end up with a car that is different than what we are used to (GM and Ford) and gave it a try anyway. She started beautifully too. Oh, and there is nothing marking the propper position for the crank on this car other than that keyed notch thing pointing straight down. So, lesson number one. Don't just read the words. Look at the pictures too. They can help. And next time someone has trouble lets just tell them to make sure the keyed notch thing is pointed straight down. I am a bit disappointed, though. I wanted to get some target practice in. Heh.

I know a lot of time has gone by since my last update, but I was out of town for a while due to my grandmother passing. That took more importance than the car.... Now I even have a computer down. Why do all the bad things happen at the same time? Ok, so we made another attempt at the timing belt following suggestions that we had received here, but received no change in the way the car acts while trying to crank it. So, My dad, who is helping me with it, decided to yank the drivers side head off again. (I have no clue why.). When he did this he ruined the gasket so since there is no auto store in the area that will carry the gasket I had to special order it.... again... So we got the new gasket put on, the head put back on, timing belt, and so on. But this time we didn't connect the exhaust to the heads. For the hell of it I put two brand new spark plugs in on the drivers side. When we tried to crank it we could hear the drivers side trying to fire with the new sparkies, but nothing from the passenger side. So, I ran to the store and bought four new plugs. I installed them all and they were all firing great, but the car wouldn't start. It acts like it wants to start, but then stops and pops back through the intake. That sounds like a timing issue to me, so I double checked my timing and all my marks are right on. I have only one mark on each pully... No arrows or anything like that that has been mentioned. I got a flash light and magnifying glass and carefully inspected each pully trying to find maybe worn marks that are barely visible but I still could only find the ones I used... We even, while we had the drivers side head off, checked the cylinder itself to make sure it was in top dead center..... and it was. Appeared to be anyway. The only thing I'm left with is the temptation to pull it out into the field and use it for some fun and stress relieving target practice. If anyone has any better ideas please feel free to share.

Yes, I am getting spark, fuel pressure, and the rest of things that had been listed. I've done test after test on this thing. My ohm meter was not propperly zeroed, as suspected. I should have thought of checking that. Frustration gets the best of us sometimes though. Touching the ohm meter's rods together gives me a reading of .6 ohms, which explains why it appeared the primary resistance was higher than the book suggested. Thankfully I can now completely rule that out as a problem. I didn't suspect the coil pack of just going bad all on its own. My worry was that with all the rain there was too much moisture in the air and moisture got inside and caused some corrosion, thus bringing the resistance up and not allowing it to give enough spark. My worry was uncalled for. As for all the timing suggestions... well, after my wife gets home later today and can watch our son I'll get out there and try everything that was suggested. Thank you all for the help, and once I get finished with the car this evening I'll post again to let you know if it worked or not. Hopefully it will. I want my truck back from my wife....

Well, I am lined up on hash marks, or lines, or dashes, or what have you. I don't even see any arrows (except the arrows on the timing belt itself that point in the direction it is supposed to turn). So maybe I'm a lucky one that doesn't have arrows or they have worn off. Then again maybe I'm extremely unlucky and the arrows have worn to look like hash marks and the actual hash marks have completely dissappeared. But I am lined up on the only hash marks I can see. Now, needing to give it another full turn... That very well could be it. I'll give that one a try. I understand the coil is actually a "pack" with two primaries and two secondaries. What you're saying is making a little sense considering both primaries are reading at 1.4. The two primaries use three contacts. To get the first primary I have to connect the ohm meter to the middle contact and to one end. To get the second contact I have to again connect to the middle contact but switch to the other end contact. Since the middle contact is shared between the two is that causing me to measure across the two primaries as you said?

Yes, I understand timing is a common mistake. I've gone back and checked my timing belt several times, but everything appears to be good with it. Appears... But what I'm wanting to know is if the primary resistance on the ignition coil being at 1.4 ohms when it should be between .63 and .77 ohms can cause a car to not start. I know very little about resistance and such.

Recently I tore my wife's '94 Legacy apart to change the head gaskets, valve cover gaskets, (gaskets, more gaskets, and even more gaskets), altenator belt, and timing belt. Well, after getting the heads off we discovered one of them had a burnt valve. So I of course had to special order the valve which took a week and a half to get it and during that time it started raining. Now, the car and all its parts was in the car port and not actually getting rained on. Well, reassembly went really smooth up until the final moment. Turned the key and it wouldn't start. I of course immediately started hunting for a wire or hose that I might have forgot to connect, but I couldn't find anything. The car just turns over without starting. From time to time it acts like it is going to fire up but immediately goes back to turning over. Well, I checked the resistance for the coil and the primary resistance is at 1.4 ohms but my repair manual reads that primary resistance should be between .63 and .77 ohms. The secondary resistance looks fine as does the resistance for each sparkplug cable. Could it be that the primary resistance being wrong is my culprit?