Project A3: Engine Progress

Pushed the car out of the garage for, hopefully, the last time today. I  borrowed a pressure washer from a friend and got the car out and dragged the transmission out into the open. A can of engine degreaser and the engine bay and trans are looking drastically better.

Got back to work on the engine assembly, at last post, I had installed the cams and had the tbelt on. Well those turned out to just be test fits, I forgot to install the cam chain tensioner when I put the cams in last weekend. So today, I got to un-install the cams and tbelt, install the tensioner, then re-install the cams and timing belt. While the tbelt was off, I removed the crank pulley and replaced the front main seal while I was there. Cams back in, timing set, tensioner cover reinstalled let me get the tbelt side of the engine almos completely finished!

The list is getting shorter after hammering through a bunch of the details. Found a couple gaskets and orings I still need to replace, so ill order some more parts this week and keep ticking things off. My bolt kit for the cam girdle said 23, but there was only 22 in the pack. Once I get that bolt I can do the final torque on the cam girdle and install the cam cover. With those things finished, I still need to flip the engine over and time the balance shafts. When I was assembling the bottom end, I got to the balance shaft timing and found that the timing mark on the sprocket to time the shafts isn’t there! We will see how that goes in a couple a days…