ok The engine wont start, but i'm 99% sure it is the timing. Machine shop seams incompetent. on the camshafts, each one has a prong sticking out, correct? And i think i read somewhere that one had to have the prong sticking up, while the other had to stick down. I have the AEM gears on, and believe the shop didnt set them this way because they are both facing the same direction. Does anyone know whether the timing marks should be at the top or at the bottom for each camshaft when at TDC? Right now when i'm at TDC both have the timing marks at the very top. What i'm trying to say is that one should have the marks at the very top, while the other should have the marks at the bottom. HELP PLEASE??????

Sorry so long

I don't know about the cam gears you have but if your talking about the timing marks that are similar to the timing marks on stock cam gears, you know there is one on just one tooth of each gear, these line up with each other like this: on the exhaust cam gear the mark is on the left; on the intake cam gear the mark is on the right. These marks line up with each other while they are lined up with the top of the cylinder head. The crank should be at tdc by lining up the marks on the timing belt gear and the block. Only problem is that if you turn your cams over with no timing belt attached and a piston is near tdc, you will bend valves b/c the valves will open up and hit the pistons. Hope this helps.

Those prongs u talk about are called dowell pins. Intake dowell pin must be down, exhaust up, when engine is TDC.

Take off valve cover and look at the holes in the cams, they should line up also.

I just read your first post about the engine trying to start and backfiring. I will bet money the timing is off b/c it souds like the marks are totally off. I hate to say it but I would also bet that you have some bent valves. I rebuilt my engine one time drunk as fuck and turned the cams over while the crank was at tdc. Needless to say I bent about 4 valves. At least now you might have an excuse to buy some ss valves. Did the shop put the whole engine back together? If so they should be responsible for setting the timing.x(

you may have broken a dowel pin also. I have broken one before. If so you'll never get the timing right. You may need to replace the dowel pin in the cam.

If both dowel pins are up you esentiall have no compression with intake and exhaust cams opening and closing almost in sync.

Sounds like the shop should hav payed more attention...



15.9 @ 86.7mph

Smooth idle? We don't need no stinking smooth idle.

Mods List:
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i'm really hoping that the screw up by the machine shop hasn't resulted in bent valves. The already took 4 weeks to do the work the first time, even though they quoted me 4 or 5 days. Im not looking forward to them having it AGAIN!! I think I might just drive the car throught the front of their building and tell them to f@#% off. And yes they did do all the work including the timing, so I am assuming they should be responsible, just like i'll be responsible for the damages I do to them. Sorry- just a little irrate right now. But hosestly, with as many times as I turned that crank by hand, wouldn't I have felt the valves hitting if they were doing so?

Nope, you would never know if they got bent by feeling or listening.

to help you out with the AEM cam gears... the markings are off a tooth from the stock markings... with teh aems, when at TDC, the tick marks on the cam gears should be pointing toward each other. the idiots at AEM mis-marked the tick marks by like half a tooth.. just line up the stock cam gears to TDC and then try to match the AEM to teh stock settings (with them set at 0 degrees).

This has been posted before, but here it is again. Each AEM gear is 1/2 tooth off. You will be one full tooth off if you use AEM's marks.

Also- for some reason you can put on AEM gears 180* backwards, there's two slots for the dowel.

Do everything they said so far ^^^above, you should be good. For some reason engine shops seem to have problems installing timing belts. :rolleyes


^^^ This is how it should look, note the AEM marks do not line up.

:rolleyes ... It still cracks me up every time I see "TRU-TIME" marked on those gears. :nono