jeffbarn

Hi,
Two questions, one has anyone seen the kind of camshaft bearing wear in the first 2 attached pics. This is for 89 951.



BTW, the camshaft looks perfect...I guess steel wins over aluminum.

2nd question, I got a camshaft cover, cam, and bearing from someone local who got it from someone else and said it was off an 87, but was not going to use it. Anyway, the camshaft bearing looks different and has a different number that does not show up on PET parts catalog. Any ideas, the part number is 944.105.119.04r, the old part (and in pet - searched through all versions) is 944.105.119.03r.


Bottom line, would like to know what people think might have happened to first bearing (to avoid in future) and 2nd would like to know if anyone has seen this other part and if you think it is OK to use this camshaft bearing.

BTW, my original camshaft has part number 944.155.105.10 and the one that is suppose to be an 87 is 944.155.105.09. It is odd that I have the later 944 NA camshaft. I have had the car since 95 and did not think prior owner would have swapped cams. I may use the one off the 87 as is seems to just slightly smoother in the bearing area. Sound reasonable?

Thanks

samluke

I had something similar happen to my car, during a race weekend. My engine mounts failed, the engine moved around and the fan cut the upper radiator hose. I had extreme overheating to the point where the oil pressure was dropping to zero.

The camshaft started to seize on the front bearing, just like yours. The exhaust valve guides started to tighetn up and the exhaust valves kissed the pistons. Fortunately that was the extent of the damage, Crank and bores were not damaged. I am just rebuilding the motor right now. It was a very expensive lesson, that I will never repeat. When the temp shows overheating, stop the car!!!!

So in my case it was oil starvation due to overheating.

With regard to re-using, no you can't. The end housing is both a radial and thrust bearing and sets the float in the camshaft. The thrust face is damaged and you don't know what end float you'll get. Its not worth the risk. You also need to make sure the surfaces of the cam are not damages as well. In my case there was some minor aluminum pickup, but it easily cleaned up.

jeffbarn

Thanks, I was not planning to use the old bearing, but rather the one I picked up...only issue is it looks different from the old one. I don't recall any similar problems to yours, but will check out the rest of the head and also check to make sure oil passages are not blocked.

Thanks,
Jeff

CarbonRevo

I'd say measure the berings of both covers with a digital caliper to make sure they are the same. They should be the same, but I would double check.

Was the 87 a turbo? If not, this could be the reason for different part numbers showing. Also, if the 87 was a turbo, your car is an 89. I'm not sure if they made different cams for the 88TS and 89 model years. Someone will chime in that knows this, but first thing you could do is measure both bearings to compare the sizes.

jeffbarn

ok, good idea to mic the bearing. The 87 was a normal 944 or possibly a 924S. According to old posts from Danno, the ...05 cam was for older 944s and turbos and the ...09 cam was used only on the later NA 944s. I am guessing the ...10 cam is just an updated part for the ...09 cam since it is in PET for later 944s. According to PET catalog, the ...05 cam was for both the 44.51 and 44.52 type engines, but then it could be wrong.

Thanks for the input!

M Berg

Do you have the possibility to take a pic of the cam house without the cover? Just wonder how it looks there, has nothing to do with your bearing wear.

jeffbarn

Sorry, already assembled.