Raiom

Did my waterpump and tensioner..Now my timing chain decided to leap beyond its means and hang around a different set of teeth. So after searching the forums im still lacking anough info to feel good about reseting timing..So I understand piston #1 has to be tdc. So after that can i just take the chain off and match the colored links with the arrows on the cam gears?? Can I turn the cam gears by hand? Do I turn them clockwise or counter clockwise? Is that all I need for timing? thanks

ajm8127

iTrader: (8)

The procedure the FSM (EM-28) outlines assumes you have removed all guides and the tensioner. (The FSM is unclear about the guide on the front side of the engine, between the water pump and crank sprocket. It does not show it in one picture, then it is back in the next, but there is no explicit instruction to install it. I would think you can leave that one on.)

Carefully put the engine back in the position it should be in. You can turn the crank and camshafts by hand, just be careful and if you feel resistance, then stop. You don't want to bend a valve. Get the marks on the intake cam sprockets and the crank sprocket aligned with the proper marks on the chain. The engine turns clockwise, but if you are only moving things half a turn or so to realign the marks, I think you could turn it either way by hand.

Install the guide at the top, and the one between the front bank intake camshaft and the water pump. Before putting the tensioner and slack side guide back on, prime the tensioner by pumping the piston manually while the tensioner is submerged in oil. Once the cavity inside the tensioner is full of oil, press in the piston, and lock it in place with a pin. Reinstall the tensioner and slack side guide. At this point it may be wise to give the crankshaft two rotations clockwise to make sure that it spin freely.

Seal it up, bolt it down, and fill it with oil. I'm not a religious man, but if you wish to say a prayer at this time, it may be appropriate.

cashoit

+1 on both these points.

I dont know if u need to remove timing cover for clearance but i do know u have to align timing marks at TDC cyl 1.

good luck man.

cardana24

iTrader: (81)

If I were to do this I would take the engine out of the car before I did anything. You will probably save a lot of time and cussing. Just my opinion.

Raiom

Thanks everyone. I already having the timing cover off and im looking directly at the chain,rails and cam gears..I guess i should do a video of some sort to show how to do it correctly..from lining up to startup..and well if the car blows then obviously it will be a video of how not to do timing..lol..Thanks for the advice..

JSutter

iTrader: (46)

I like to take the upper intake manifold off and then the valve covers. Its far easier when you can see the cam lobes. I use a wrench to hold them in place. I painted marks all over the cams, sprockets, chains, and crank just for easy identification. Once you get the chains on you can rotate the crank to make sure everything is A OK. With the spark plugs out the engine turns over freely. If you skipped a tooth you will know immediately.

Raiom

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mlUJQJKZg0


jaaay sutta got skills!! hopefully this video can help people and become a how to..

matts95max

iTrader: (11)

nice effort on putting this vid together!

Raiom

thanks will try my best..lets see what happens.

Raiom

Removed all guide rails and tensioner. Chain is of by 7 teeth..ouch!! I heard somone mention pray..already started that..now all i have to do is bring the arrows to the colored links..that seems prety easy..where do i run the risk?? I also notice the two other chains behind the main chain..do i need to take those off too?

cardana24

iTrader: (81)

prime your tensioner in fresh engine oil while you are in there. Also, something I did and other have done too; once everything is back together, pull your fuel pump fuse and crank the engine over until you have built oil pressure, and hopefully it will not skip when you fire the engine up for the first time. I am not sure if this will be helpful to you, but here is a picture of my chains when the engine is at TDC.

Raiom

CARDINAL thank you. I will do that. Can i put that pic in my how to video? I just brought the crank to tdc. My cam gears are off by 7 teeth. I can't move them to alignment. I'm assuming because now that the crank is at tdc the cam gears are not moving because Tue valves are touching the pistons. Any suggestions.?

cardana24

iTrader: (81)

Sure, just get my screen name right

If the cams are off then you probably need to pinch the tensioners and slide the cam gears off. Set the cams to TDC (there is a picture of this in the FSM) also there are marks on the inner timing cover that help you line this up). Once you have the cams in the proper position you can put the secondary chains back on and then release the pressure on the cam tensioners. Once the secondary chains are set then you can set the primary chain. Some of the fourth gen 3.5 swap threads in the all motor section may help you out a lot because often times there are pictures of setting the timing. Let me look in my photobucket to see if I have pictures of the cams at TDC.


**edit, if you valves are stopping you from getting the cams in the right place (read: valves hitting pistons), then you will need to take the cams out and set them in the right position then bolt them back in. *all of this is assuming your valves are not bent*

JSutter

iTrader: (46)

7 teeth is not good. Did you run the motor like that? I would think you would have bent some valves.

Raiom

New video below includes comments and suggestions from Jsutter,Cardana24, and new angled coverage starting at 3:30 through the video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMjbCy34cng

Jsutter no i did not run the car it idled fine though. I checked compression before tearing it down and compression was 178 at the front 3 and 179 in the rear 3. I pray I didnt..


Cardana I will rotate the crank with the chain back on and see what 7 rotations will get me. Thanks guys for checking up on this how to as its also helping me fix my first nissan.

It would be nice to know how to get to the cam tensioners and what the look like on this car. Using the search engine like a kid in a candy store..

JSutter

iTrader: (46)

I just did the tensioners in a 3.5. You need to remove both primary cam gears, depress the tensioner, lock it with a pin, remove upper intake mainfold and valve covers, and finally remove the front cam bearing caps to get to the secondary tensioners. Its been a few years since I have been into a 3.0 but I assume its similar.

Product_Of_Korea

iTrader: (8)

here are a few pics of how and how not to do the timing.
Please check my timing installation

Raiom

Thanks Jsutter removing valve covers as we speak..Video of how to remove front valve cover has been added to the "Reset timing on a 4th gen maxima Video"Thanks Product of Korea for that link..Those are good pics I will include them as well..Also can I just call you POK cuz product of korea is really long..lol..

video below. Removing front valve cover to get to front cam gears. IF anyone can tell me what the tnesioners look like would be great. Do i turn clockwise? Im going to set the front cams first. Thanks everyone for contributing to my car and video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZgCZlGUGxQM

Raiom

Removed cam sprokets secondary chains and tensioners..I can turn the cam gears freely now..looking for marks to show alignment of the two smaller cam sprockets behind the main ones

FallenOne

iTrader: (17)

Your doing a great job man, the final video should be great for noobies. Also i look forward to the reference's and instruction on replacing the water pump and timing chain tensioner as mine has been bad for well over 200K. I do have to say your narration is much better than my own would be, considering mine would be primarily foul expletives.

Keep up the good work!

Heck you should do a 00Vi swap for dummies video too!

Also, the intake manifold has just the obvious four 12mm bolts in the front and four on the back, 2 for the Brackets that you can see and 2 for the EGR guide tube. Their all easy to get to and all 12mm IIRC. Pull off that Manifold; Throttle Body, Idle Air Control Valve and all and your good to go. Also Clean up as much as you can while your in there, the EGR, IACV, TB, and UIM will all be dirty.

Raiom

Thank you Fallen One I appreciate the motivation. That vieo for waterpump should be up soon. Just finished the manifold in like 20 minutes think ill do a short vid on that as theres is a nice how to with pics on the site. Maybe they will let me throw the link in there..

Raiom

THROTTLE BODY and EGR really dirty..whats a good cleaner?

Raiom

How do these look. For some reason they wont move to be aligned. I have the front lined and the cranks is at TDC. Am i suppose to reverse the crank out of TDC then line p the rear cams?Im confused..I thought they would be easy to line up once the cams were loose. Im also looking at the lobesbut dont know what im looking for when the Fsm says mark them..

Raiom

Heres the side view of the rear cams. I need to turn them forward to line them up but they stop when valves touch the pistons.. The front cams are lined.

ampire

iTrader: (12)

1) The secondary sprockets have dimples on them, the dimples should face each other


2) the inner timing cover has a bump to align the primary sprockets (they have an arrow) to TDC


3) Cam position @ TDC on cylinder 1 should look like this

4) Oil pump has a TDC indicator however it is not super reliable. Water pump cover has a better indicator. The leading edge of the crankshaft snout's woodruff key should match with the \ on the oil pump. There can be 1 tooth off using the oil pump indicator only. Gently place the outer timing cover on (i put some masking tape along the edge to keep the edges from scraping the inner cover) to mock up and slide the crank pulley on. Check to see if you are also at TDC indicator on the water pump cover as well as oil pump \.



If you have already gotten out of alignment between the crankshaft and camshafts you may be best off removing the cams, setting the crank to TDC, and then reinstalling the camshafts to match TDC.

cardana24

iTrader: (81)

^^^this post has the information you need. If you need to move a cam a little bit to you can do that with a big wrench to get everything lined up.

Raiom

Thank you Cardana u a life saver..It is great to receive more input. When i set the cams i put the timing cover back on and used the black cover over the waterpump as tdc indicator. At the same time I had an extension on top of the pistons so i can see it physically move up. As soon as i did the I removed the cams and chain.Reset the front cams and they were easey. Then when i get to the rear only one of them wants to set right while the other locks and hits the piston. I will remove them again and rotate the crank one more time 360 degrees to TDC again and reset the cams one more time. Thank you so much

Raiom

AWESOME!! Rotated the crank 360 degrees to Tdc again and now im able to move the rear cams into alignment. This video is coming out sweeet..he he he now to throw the chain on..

ampire

iTrader: (12)

Good to see that it is coming along. Don't forget to prime the tensioners. Obviously don't turn the engine over until you have all the tensioners and guides on the slightest movement will cause the cam to pop over and you would have to pull it back with a crescent wrench. Also, remember to set the chain to match the indicators and that it will take several rotations to return the colored links to the indicators after you initially turn it over. Be sure to locktite the cam bolts and the crank bolt.

Raiom

Thanks ampire..locktite?? sounds familiar..is that like a sealent for the threads or something?

ampire

iTrader: (12)

Yeah if you removed the cam bolts to rotate the cams (not sure if you did this). If not, then disregard. I don't think you need to remove the cam bolts to take the cams off actually. Loctite is a threadlocker, put a tiny bit (not too much, small amount) on the threads of the cam bolts. Also, be sure to torque the cam bolts and the crank pulley bolt to spec, spec is in the owners manual but its a lot of torque (90-100ish for the cam bolts off the top of my head).

Raiom

Do u prime the tensioner by holding the piston in and while soaked in oil release the piston? just curious because when i squeeze the piston back it releases the oil that it soaked in. awesome at least i got some torque specs..

ampire

iTrader: (12)

Be sure to check the torque specs, I am not sure what they are exactly.

To prime the tensioner, what I did was get a plastic cup, fill it with oil. Get oil inside the tensioner and put the piston in. Put the tensioner in the oil and squeeze it in and out a few times so it sucks in oil then squeeze it all the way in (this will be difficult) and put the little push pin piece into the hole that keeps the plunger depressed. Once you get it all set up and the chain and guide on you take the pin out and it will pop out and hold tension.

Raiom

wow..SO I FINALLY get everything together..timing was perfect..then i turn the crank by hand and everything was smooth untill the 10th rotation of the crank. The engine locks up. So i reset timing again by taking off the cams and putting crank at tdc. Then again it goes to the 10th rotations by hand and locks up. What in the world is going on??

Raiom

ADDED pb blaster inside the spark plug holes and it finally got the engine rotatintg again..pretty weird..maybe rust build up not sure.

ampire

iTrader: (12)

Could be stiff from compression and also, I have found that the engine tends to squirt oil out of the tensioners after a few rotations which could lead to it stiffening.

Raiom

Want to thank everyone for there time..I put pb blaster in it and started rotating nicely..On top of that everything is working fine. I ended up replacing the cam shaft positions sensor on the car and she purs like a kitten. Thanks everyone. I will be putting up the how to video as soon as editing is done. Thanks

Ricke

I believe my timing chain and cam chains jumped.

I follow the manual. I also removed the "bottom black oil pan." I also remove the 2 outer bolts in the "upper oil pan." I still cannot remove the timing cover. Please help?