It won't start

[davedew]

When you say it won't crank with the pulley bolt done up, is that with the alternator pulley on?

When you have had the engine in bits have you ever taken all the bottom pulleys off including the cambelt pulley? There should be a thrust washer behind the cambelt pulley. If this is missing the pulleys might be doing up against the front of the oil pump and jamming it up.

Might be worth a look.

[brainbug007]

Hard to describe as I'm not sure of the proper names for stuff but here goes:

theres a spoked wheel 1st which the timing belt fits onto so we'll call that wheel A. another wheel then fits onfront of that which has the teeth for the crank sensor and the belt to run the alternator fits onto it, i'll call that wheel B.

so when only wheel A is on with the timing belt, it turns no probs. As soon as wheel B is fitted and bolted on, it won't turn by hand using the bolt anymore.

[davedew]

There should be a washer between wheel A and the front of the oil pump. If this isn't there when you fit wheel B and do up the bolt, they could all be doing up tight against the front of the engine stopping it from turning. If you can not do the crank bolt up to the correct torgue value without it locking the engine something is wrong, and needs to be resolved before attempting to start the engine. How did you manage to try and start the engine last night if you can not do the bolt up tight?

[brainbug007]

I'll have to check tonight if there's a washer there or not. When I put it back together last night after a few goes of taking the pulley (wheel b) off and loosing the engine again and then putting it back on and it getting stuck that maybe it was designed that way as I had to jam it to be able to loosen the bolt otherwise the engine would just spin counter clockwise. I was just putting a screwdriver through the camshaft pulley to stop is spinning so I could loosen the bolt. So after a few goes of this I decided it must be some sort of design thing and tried putting all the auxillaries back on to give it a go. I figured if it was truely jammed because of something like the washer you've mentioned the starter wouldn't be able to spin the engine same as when the whole thing was hydrolocked because of there being too much oil in the cylinders.

[brainbug007]

I double checked and it definitely won't turn either direction by hand with the pulley fitted. Strangely though even with the pulley off and the bolt done up tight on the cam belt sprocket, it will turn fairly easily??

I took the cam belt off and had a look. the thrust washer looks to on there and pushed up against the back of the cam belt sprocket? I'm sure I did take this off ages ago when I was working on the engine so is there a wrong way to put this back on? I think it has a notch on it for the woodruf key so it can only go on one way?

[vetteman1355]

It may be that the washer has been crushed too much if was tightened beyond the required torque, if you can get someone to measure one and do a comparison might be a good idea.

You could also measure from the surface of the washer to where the nut fits and compare that dimension to the width of the pulley.

Nigel

[davedew]

You say you can fully tighten the bolt with just the cambelt pulley on.

The next thing I would try is leave the cambelt cover off. I know it won't start because the crankshaft position sensor is mounted on it. Then fit the alternator pulley and fully torgue the bolt.

Does the engine still turn over? If yes then the pulley must be catching on the metal cambelt cover and getting stuck. If it still won't turn over there has got to be something wrong with how the pulleys are seating on the crankshaft.

Post up some pictures of the front of the engine and the pulleys if you can for us to take a look at.

[brainbug007]

I tried turning without the cover on 1st as that's how I noticed it wouldn't hand crank with the alternator pulley on. I was going to try and get the cambelt pulley off next to have a look at the washer. If it looks ok I was then thinking of taking the plugs out to remove the compression and bolting on the alternator pulley to see if it would hand turn with no compression and no cambelt to see maybe if the alternator pulley is catching the cambelt somehow? I'll take some pic's tonight and hopefully it'll be somthing obvious. Starting to loose heart now and thinking of ditching the engine and just getting a brand new zetec

[robo]

Brainbug lose heart!!!!!!!!!!!! I dont think so

Its going to be something very simple.Its all just nuts, bolts and bits of metal but it has to go together in the right order.

Bob

[davedew]

Even with the plugs in it should turn over by hand using a ratchet.
I wouldn't recommend turning over the crankshaft without having the cambelt on and correctly timed as you could touch the pistons on the valves. You wouldn't damage anything just doing it by hand, but it could touch.

If you have done the test I suggested without the cambelt cover then I would say it has got to be something to do with the thrust washer. You will be able to tell which way round it would have been originally by the dirt on it leaving a shadow of the pulley.