Having a little trouble with my supercharged '86 944. Hopefully some of you can help or at least laugh. The car was bought last year with a rebuilt engine and a bunch of other cool stuff. I got the car running and inspected. So now I was excited to give it a little work out. Came around a corner and gunned it up to 6000 rpm in second, changed into third and revved it out to 5500 rpm, then coasted to the stop sign. Upon going the car went for a little bit, backfired twice and died. Luckily I was able to get into a parking lot when it died. So I took a look at the engine bay and checked wiring, hoses, and leaks. Nothing present. Tried to start it a couple of times and finally it fired up. Stepped on the gas and it died immediately. Would not start up again.

I was able to drag it home and now I am looking for the no start problem. Checked fuel and spark. Had both. So I took off the timing belt cover and found a couple of weird things going on. For starters, there was no balance shaft belt. Actually there was not even a balance shaft sprocket. HAHA. The timing belt has also slid toward the rear of the car and was showing the metal strands.

So with no balance shaft sprockets and a messed up timing belt, what should I do? Fix it or part it out? If there was a rebuild without the balance shaft sprockets, what else could have been left out? Oh and when I try to start the car up, it sounds very normal. I guess a compression test would tell me if valves were bent. Take a look at the pictures.

 

Hmm, not good. Turn the engine to TDC, check the timing mark on the cam sprocket and also in the inspection hole in the bellhousing. Make sure the engine is still on time first. The previous owner may have removed the balance shaft belt. This is what I did with mine, and as long as you reinforce the oil pickup tube so that it won't crack and break off, you will be OK with not running the belt on there. The pictures show a lot of debris in there though, hopefully some teeth on the timing belt did not shear off!

Off topic but what type of supercharger setup are you using? I am in the process of trying to get mine to fire up, using an Eaton M90 on an 86 944 also. What part of the world are you located?

 

Good to know about the balance shaft belt. That makes me feel a bit better about the engine rebuild.

Yeah, checking the timing was what I was going to do next. Looking at clark's garage to figure out how to do that.

The supercharger setup is the procharger from Speed Force Racing. Then I have a Vitesse MAF run by the SMT-6 piggyback. I have had it up and running, but it is a real pain to tune just right. It is not any fault of the manufactures, but it is trying to do something the DME was never meant to do.

Located in Pittsburgh. Oh, should put that in my info.

 

Sweet setup. Got pictures of it by any chance? Its always interesting comparing everyone's supercharger setups on these cars... its like there are no two exactly alike.

Checking the timing is pretty simple, put a socket on the crank bolt and turn the engine by hand slowly, while watching through the inspection hole in the end of the cam housing (hole to the right of the distributor cap). Once you line up the mark, check towards the back of the motor on the top of the bellhousing you will see a small rectangular hole (near the speed/reference sensors), and if the motor is timed correctly still, you will see a dash on the flywheel.

 

Thanks. It was not my build. I bought it when it would not run. Got it running and here I am. Will post a few pictures tomorrow.

I was able to set the timing on the front of the engine. I actually took off the cover on the distributor a little and saw the tick in the metal and was able to line up the tick on the sprocket. Now the flywheel appears that it might not line up just right. There is a vertical metal piece inside the inspection hole. When I jump up to the center of the engine and look straight down the timing mark is a little off. At what angle should I be looking at the timing mark? If it is off by one tooth, what would the engine do?

Thanks

 

Looks like you're missing a nut on the water pump guard rail. Perhaps it fell off and wedged itself somewhere down there.

Also, your timing belt tension pulley is the wrong way. That's why the belt is walking backwards.

 

Also, you'll note that the nut on the tension pulley isn't fully threaded (because the pulley is backwards). You may have just saved yourself an engine!!!

 

Here are a few more pictures:

 

Is the tension pulley the sprocket in the third picture? I see the nut missing now. Thanks!

How hard of a fix is this? Keep in mind I just completed a clutch job on my 944 NA (and I'm tired of working on cars!!).

 

taking a guess...probably one of the timing sprockets is out of round or isn't aligned right. that might explain the rubber shredding

 

Exactly, the third picture. If you did the clutch, you can handle this.

 

oh....after daredevil's comment. it dawned on me. yer tensioner's not fully threaded and yer shredding the timing belt because the tensioner be it's the WRONG tensioner. that's not a timing belt tensioner. that's a balance shaft belt tensioner.

the two tensioners are almost the same except they're mirror images of each other. the timing belt tensioner is supposed to have "open" side facing engine forward. the balance shaft belt tensioner is supposed to have "open" side facing engine rearward.

 

The teeth are still intact all the way around. It is just shredded in between the teeth. Thought it might be from going off the backside of the pulleys.

Would this be fixed by this?
1. Removing the alternator and power steering belts.
2. Taking off the distributor and removing the timing belt.
3. Fixing the tension pulley and belt guide.
4. Then crank the crank bolt to line up the flywheel. Will this change the distributor sprocket if the belt is off?
5. Then put a new timing belt belt back on. Will I need a flywheel lock?

 

That would explain it!

 

That's right. Make sure the motor is a top dead centre before taking off the belt and you'll be fine. No need for a flywheel lock.