can i stump the 3geez gods...

[iamvandemon]

gods of the 3rd gen, here is your challenge..

my friend has an 89' lxi hatch w/220k. he was zooming around and the timing belt snapped. he took it to the mechanic and had the timing belt replaced.

so he's zooming around again everything is fine then suddenly he looses power and the engine locks up and wont turn over...

later in my garage it turns over but really hard


so I take a look at it and this is what I find:

heavy oil sprays on the firewall above the fuel filter (passenger side) and on underside of hood above valve cover slightly towards the driver side.

I drained the coolant and it is very dark (rust or oil not sure... but probably oil or both)

I pull the valve cover, upper timing belt cover, and turn the engine to TDC. I find that the cam gear is 10degrees or so off of where it should be.



soooo, what happened?

did he run it low on coolant, seize the engine, and the belt jumped?

or was it something else?

(this weekend i'll be pulling the head to see what happened and how good you are)

[ACCORD EX]

well the belt broke on him while running and that's a bad thing it self ! :( he could have internal engine damage !

MIKE

[cruznz]

hmmmm......belt wasn't tensioned properly, after renewal,belt jumped ...possible piston/valve damage,....just a guess.....

[A20A1]

The engine is broken... sorry.

You might have a crack in the block or head or both. or just a blown out gasket which caused the oil spray and the oil to mix with the coolant.

I'd say you may have a nice hole in 1 or 2 pistons... I also believe the valves will be mangled in at least 2 out of the 4 sets.

It's possible the timing belt skiped cause the engine froze due to a rod coming loose or lack of oil, or some serious detonation from bad ignition timing or over reving the engine... I don't think it's the other way around unless the belt was installed wrong from the get go... or like mentioned earlier... not tensioned tight enough.

Or the belt tensionor itself came loose but Whose to say.



... after all, it's only a guess.

[easyryder]

I think A20A1 sums it up very well
My moto is If you buy a car with a timing belt..REPLACE IT pretty cheap insurance

[Illicit3rdgenRacer]

it sounds like a blown head gasket because we blew a head gasket in my friends Stratus and it had like everything you said oil in tha coolant and all that.

[Mike's89AccordLX]

I bet the pistons bent the valves and his internals are trash now. I know this from experience :) I had my T belt break a long time ago and my internals were toast.

[iamvandemon]

A20A1 is the winner!!!

he wasn't right but he was the closest....

pistons 2 and 3 had holes burnt into or through them.. i imagin that the deposits on the cylinder walls is what finnaly ceized the engine, since there is no damage to the valves etc...

as it turns out though this was not a fair question because now that i am looking at the engine i think that what i thaught was oil in the antifreez was just lots of rust and crap... i'm retarded so this is very possible...

well thanks to all who played...

ps. i'll be dropping the new engine in this week

[1988starter]

Originally posted by iamvandemon
A20A1 is the winner!!!

he wasn't right but he was the closest....

pistons 2 and 3 had holes burnt into or through them.. i imagin that the deposits on the cylinder walls is what finnaly ceized the engine, since there is no damage to the valves etc...

as it turns out though this was not a fair question because now that i am looking at the engine i think that what i thaught was oil in the antifreez was just lots of rust and crap... i'm retarded so this is very possible...

well thanks to all who played...

ps. i'll be dropping the new engine in this week

Good luck and glad to hear you are keeping with the car.

[iamvandemon]

well I dropped the new engine in. it started the first turn and runs like a champ... next I’ll be working over the suspension, rest of the drive train, and interior.
I just picked up a wrecked Suzuki gs, so I’ve been spending most of my downtime working on it though.

[jb2wheels]

I thought the A20 was non-interference.

On a different note - what Suzuki GS did you get? You do mean a Suzuki motorcycle, right?

[iamvandemon]

What do you mean by "non-interference"?

its a 80' Suzuki GS550 L with 12k. the guy took really good care of it so it is almost perfect. well at least for an 80'. my brother works with him so he sold it to me for $200!! he wrecked it at low speed so it isn’t to bad. bent forks, busted front fender, bent handlebars, a crease in the exhaust, scraped up crash bar, and busted highway peg. that’s about it, and it runs like a champ. i just picked up used replacements for all that on e-bay for around $125.

its actually a really strong running bike, for a 550. 4 cylenders, with 4 carbs, and a 4 to 2 exhaust, so it has ample flow though the engine.

any way for $200, I couldn’t pass it up...

[Justin86]

Good pick up no the bike. It sucks blowing a piston dosen't it.

[iamvandemon]

it sure does... good thing i wasnt the one who burned a hole in it. the owner before me did. i bought it from him for $175 including shipping.

[k-roy]

I bet its fucked

[iamvandemon]

not IS, "WAS". its all good now..

[BootMachine]

Yeah...I thought the A20A was a NON-INTERFERENCE engine. If the timing belt snaps the engine should just stop running!

How the hell did you get a hole in your piston?

[iamvandemon]

Abnormal operation may allow combustion pressures to develop so fast that the heat and pressure will "explode" the remaining unburned fuel. This produces the knock, often called "ping", carbon knock, etc. Actually this is detonation. The knock results from the violent explosion when the normal flame front runs into the secondary flame front. Detonation will cause piston and ring damage, top ring groove wear, scoring, sticking rings, loose head gaskets and possible complete engine failure.

Detonation can be caused by:
Lean fuel mixture
Fuel octane too low
Improper ignition timing
Lugging
Carbon deposits
Excessive milling of heads or block, which will increase compression ratio.
Pre-ignition, as the term suggests, is the ignition of the fuel-air mixture before the regular ignition spark from the spark plug. If the regular spark occurs shortly after the pre-ignition, the colliding of the two flame fronts will cause a pinging noise. Preignition causes loss of engine power and can cause severe damage to pistons, rings and valves.

Detonation and pre-ignition are so closely related that it is en difficult to distinguish one from the other by sound. Each can lead to the other and either condition can cause extensive engine damage. Inspection of damaged pistons and rings quite often indicate which caused the damage.

Damaged pistons and rings usually mean replacement. The same damage can occur again unless the cause of the detonation or pre-ignition is corrected.

Pre-ignition can be caused by:

Carbon deposits that remain incandescent
Spark plugs too hot a heat range
Spark plugs not firmly seated against gasket
Detonation or the condition leading to it
Sharp edges in combustion chamber
Valves operating at higher than normal temperature because of excessive guide clearance or improper seal with valve seats.
Overheating
Ignition crossfiring. Induced voltage in spark plug wires that run parallel to each other for long distances

[BootMachine]

yeah ok....I knew all that! Good post though!

HOW THE HELL DID YOU GET A HOLE IN YOUR PISTON!?!?!?

That engine must have been pinging for a while because a simple timing belt issue would not cause that!

The timing belt would come off and the engine would simply wind down to a stop! It may ping a bit but I dont think it will burn a hole in the piston!

No way that was caused ONLY by the timing belt...the engine was damaged and running damaged!

[iamvandemon]

you missed the point for that long post.

THE HOLE WAS "BURNT" THROUGH THE PISTON. IT WAS NOT PUT THERE BY THE VALVES.

[iamvandemon]

and yes I agree that the timing belt had nothing to do with the engine damage.

and yes the engine damage took place over an extended period of time. the piston burnt through molecule by molecule over several years.