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I Think I Just Ruined My Engine!


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Grif
User

Mar 26, 2009, 12:00 PM

Post #1 of 6 (5169 views)
I Think I Just Ruined My Engine! Sign In

I have an awful feeling in my stomach.

I replaced my timing belt and water pump in my '03 Hyundai Santa Fe 2.7. I put it back together, took it for a test drive, and noticed that it idled a little rough but seemed to run fine at normal speeds. I drove it to work yesterday, the rough idle was a little worse, and I had myself convinced that I must have the timing belt off by a sprocket.

I started it up today and drove it down the driveway. It was very sluggish; no power and stalled a couple times.

Now I got to thinking and looking online...I rotated one of the camshaft sprockets a full revolution to line up the timing marks while the belt was off with a breaker bar and a socket. I'm guessing I bent some valves and the problem got worse as I drove it yesterday.

Any thoughts? Am I looking at thousands of dollars in repairs?

This is the first timing belt I've ever changed. I wish I would have paid the mechanic a few hundred dollars to do it for me.

Nick in Kalamazoo


Tom Greenleaf
Ultimate Carjunky / Moderator
Tom Greenleaf profile image

Mar 26, 2009, 12:52 PM

Post #2 of 6 (5161 views)
Re: I Think I Just Ruined My Engine! Sign In

Arggh! Yes - you might have bent valves but probably in just one cylinder if it was forced while engine was off. It would probably have given you a fight to pass a spot when turning the cam sprocket with belt off.

You should be able to isolate which cylinder as I doubt from what I see here it's more than one is not firing properly AND try to diagnose if just valve or if piston also got damaged. You'll know when you take the head off to fix that. With any luck it won't be that bad but continuing to drive it now isn't doing it any favors.

Cha Ching - The guess "du jour" is that you may get away with just new valves and have it checked at a machine shop - bummer but would not be the end of this engine IMO. Still have to get all the way there to find out for sure,

T



Grif
User

Mar 26, 2009, 6:46 PM

Post #3 of 6 (5142 views)
Re: I Think I Just Ruined My Engine! Sign In

Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Tom. I haven't tore into this yet, but I'm afraid the valves are bent. I don't want to start the car up again, but when I ran it earlier today, it actually moved faster when I let off the gas than when I pressed the accelerator pedal.

Now that we're talking removing cylinder heads, I'm starting to get out of my comfort zone so I guess I had better just take it to a professional and get ready to shell out some cash. That is, unless you can convince me that this is something I can do without much V6 engine disassembly experience.

What's with these interference engines? I heard that the trend has shifted and auto makers are starting to get away from interference engines. Is that so?

Thanks for reading and empathizing with me. I feel like an idiot tonight.

Nick in Kalamazoo


Tom Greenleaf
Ultimate Carjunky / Moderator
Tom Greenleaf profile image

Mar 26, 2009, 7:39 PM

Post #4 of 6 (5140 views)
Re: I Think I Just Ruined My Engine! Sign In

Nick,

Don't let it get you down - you were trying to do the right thing and it didn't work out - stuff happens.

You CAN diagnose it though with compression testing and isolate which and hope only one cylinder. If you can peg it to just one then you can apply compressed air to just that one thru plug hole and see where the air comes out while it's on TDC and both valves should be tight which I bet they are not.

YOU MIGHT get wicked lucky and find the plug took a hit only or something pleasantly surprising like that,

T

PS: Again - don't run it for long like this - bad for everything especially converters trying to eat up too much raw gas caused by anything that makes an engine run poorly



Grif
User

Mar 27, 2009, 7:01 AM

Post #5 of 6 (5131 views)
Re: I Think I Just Ruined My Engine! Sign In

Tom,

Thanks for the words of encouragement. I do have a compression tester and will try to figure out which cylinders are affected. Like you said, hopefully it's only one cylinder or maybe even a messed up spark plug. We'll see. I do fear the worst, though.

What's the best way to tell when the piston is at TDC?

I'll let you know!

Nick


(This post was edited by Grif on Mar 27, 2009, 7:02 AM)


Tom Greenleaf
Ultimate Carjunky / Moderator
Tom Greenleaf profile image

Mar 27, 2009, 7:35 AM

Post #6 of 6 (5125 views)
Re: I Think I Just Ruined My Engine! Sign In

I don't know the engine specifically at all but bet it's distributorless so you can't just look at a rotor to tell. Instead the chances are (could be wrong) if lower pulley has markings just as the lower gear for belt did that would be TDC for #1 cylinder.

If that was on TDC when you spun the camshaft that cylinder was up top and would be closest for valves to hit because while turning camshaft the valves were doing there thing. Only one call at a time is TDC on firing stroke when valves should both be shut. One other time on top it's finishing exhausting out AND opening valve for more fuel mix meaning you only get one revolution with compression while piston is at top in four stroke engines.

You can use soft wire or see piston up top thru plug hole OR watch valves that they are both in shut position while slowly turning engine by crank bolt.

You can also cancel one plug at a time by removing the wire and grounding thru an old plug and the one cylinder that doesn't change the way it runs will be your culprit cylinder.

Blowing air in the bad one will show air out intake, possibly exhaust, or hope not blow right out oil cap left removed meaning the piston probably has a hole. To blow air use a blow gun air nozzle with tapered rubber or some compression testers may be fudged to blow air in instead of taking compression if you selection of gizmos for tools is up there.



That's a cute simplified graphic (hope that shows) for basics of how 4 cycle/stroke engine's do their thing and you can see how a valve could crash by that graphic.

It would be nice to know what you are up for to some degrees before taking it all apart. Don't overdo running this as it's not good for it anymore to keep running.

Good luck,

T







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