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What do you think? Cam slipped?

hellraiser319

Hellraising since 1986
May 17, 2010
1,323
0
West Bend, WI
Well, driving home a couple nights ago, car seemed to act a little weird, but nothing out of the ordinary on the way home from work. Get home, go inside and eat dinner, come back out to go visit with friends, notice it's idling a little weird. Start driving, definitely feels like a miss or something, exhaust sound seems different too. Then the codes pop up.

I'll try to cliff note this as best as possible. Basically, got a P0174 (Bank 2 lean) and first P0301 (Cyl 1 misfire), Ultragauge was showing the fuel trim for bank 2 being way up there, about 20-25%, bank one was showing usual -1-5%. At one point, came to be a 0300, multiple misfire, but after that cleared, kept on resting on 0301. So, got to investigating. Driving it, in gear stopped, obvious shake, you can hear popping in the exhaust somewhat randomly. Accelerating, little less power than before, will pull full RPM range, but takes a little longer. Gas mileage seems to have dropped, probably because it's dumping fuel in bank 2 to compensate for lean condition... Things I did/checked:

Power balance test, disabled coils, then disabled injectors, nothing obvious with either, cyl 1 a tiny bit if anything.

Both upstream 02 sensors replaced, figured the fuel trim was bonkers, maybe it was failing on the one side, and might as well do both. No change.

Moved coil 1 to cyl 3. No change.

Moved plug 1 to cyl 5. No change.

Moved injector 1 to cyl 2. No change. (I figure by using different cylinders for each and leaving them there, if the misfire comes up on any of them I know which is bad. 2 birds with one stone type of thing)

Change fuel filter, maybe it's clogged, cheap fix, about due anyway. Nope.

Fuel pressure, (thank you Ford for removing the schrader valves), after acquiring my scanner, maybe this is the issue, weak fuel pressure, not getting to the #2 rail and cyl 1 for some reason? Check the pressure, nothing less than 37.5 psi. Not that either.

Bad gas? Dumped a bottle of HEET (recent rain, maybe gas cap is leaking water in, one of the fast fill ones), fuel injector cleaner, and topped it off with fresh gas, half tank full. No improvement...yet.

Power to coil and injector plugs was fine, compared with other cylinders.

Propane test for vacuum leaks, doused entire intake with tuner wash, doused again with MCCC since it's a little thicker and foams up a bit thinking that would make an obvious change in idle if anything was leaking. Nothing.

Finally say screw it, grabbed the compression tester from autozone. Figure if it's misfiring on 1, fuel and spark seem to be legit, maybe something mechanical. Well...rounding to nearest 2.5: 1-145 2-165 3-165 4-160 5-175 6-182.5 7-197.5 8-185

So, after doing the compression test, did a leakdown real quick on #1, moved the crank to tdc, luckily it was on compression stroke, gave a listen, intake is quiet, couldn't get my ear too close, but exhaust was quiet, didn't hear anything or see any bubbles in the coolant, typical blow by in the oil fill. Also did the compression test with some of the MCCC since it was convenient, and it's designed to clean the combustion chamber anyway, got it to about 150.

Didn't drive it at this point to double check to see if the fuel injector was fouling up, so I did at this point, seemed to start driving a little better, drove it nice, gave it a little hell, 60mph, 30mph, didn't seem as bad, the bad gas theory was kinda fitting, but get home, start it up again, code comes back, still rough idling.

So all in all, in spite of the clean slate on the last oil analysis, and not hearing any noises, only thing I can think of, tensioners are really worn out and it jumped a tooth? At this point that's the only thing that makes sense, unless anyone else has a better idea? Could bank 1 really be that worn out? Possession?

Really sucks because I have to drive it until I get the trans back in the Aspire, which will probably be Friday...

Anyway, post up any other things to check, suggestions, "this is it"'s if you have them, I think I pulled enough hair out over this one....

Edit: MCCC = Mopar Combustion Chamber Cleaner - essentially Seafoam on steroids, thicker and foams up on contact. Forgot to throw that in there...
 

hellraiser319

Hellraising since 1986
May 17, 2010
1,323
0
West Bend, WI
Crown Vic... 03, I'll save the click to fquick since that site is hit or miss sometimes...

Plugs looks normal/same on all cylinders. Same p0301 comes up regardless of where plug, coil or fuel injector are. haven't moved any back yet and still the same code.

Exactly like you said, slipped cam is the only thing that makes sense, judging by the compression of one side vs the other. Hopefully UPS delivers trans parts for the Aspire so I can put that back together tonight, I really don't want to risk slipping another notch over, piston vs valve is not appetizing.
 

hellraiser319

Hellraising since 1986
May 17, 2010
1,323
0
West Bend, WI
Reading this article, pretty much adds another vote for the late valve timing/slipped a link category. The low compression, misfire codes, rough idle and weak performance, even the startup rattle that I thought was the reman. starter that was in there when I bought it. I just hope I can get to it before it slips one or more links and I get piston to valve... sucks not being able to borrow a car and having the DD down for the count... :noes:
 

hellraiser319

Hellraising since 1986
May 17, 2010
1,323
0
West Bend, WI
Well, so far I have the passenger cam cover off, partially because it's more of a pain in the ass to remove reading up on it... Looks like a bomb went off in there. Tensioner guide doesn't look terrible, but hard to see from this angle. The other guide, in pieces. Hoping to have the driver side cover off and the timing cover off by night time, hopefully ill have an answer to how much that chain slipped, and if that engine is going to be worth putting back together.... :noes: :noes: :noes:
 

hellraiser319

Hellraising since 1986
May 17, 2010
1,323
0
West Bend, WI
Ok, both cam covers off, timing cover off. Verdict: Passenger cam was off 1 notch. Straight guides, one partially broken, one in pieces. Tensioner guides, passenger side into aluminum, but not bad, driver side still had some plastic left. Found the plastic body tensioners in there, there are green x's on my cam covers, so idk if that's saying it originally had steel, timing service was done, and these are replacements, or original from factory. I don't remember what the 03's came with originally. Being only 1 notch off, I'm gonna go ahead and put the new components in, but still check compression to be 100% sure nothing got squashed.

Pictures so far...
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10151133136434646.443700.751944645&type=1&l=a62803c0d2
 

hellraiser319

Hellraising since 1986
May 17, 2010
1,323
0
West Bend, WI
Ok, all back together. Compression check on all cylinders to confirm the slipped bank didn't suffer damage, and to make sure I didn't screw anything up on both sides while the chains were off. All cylinders were 190-200 across the board. :woot: Also, during compression testing, sounded much better cranking than it did before as well. Got an oil change in there, put everything 100% back together, fired it up, sounds normal again. Power steering was a bit unhappy and the transmission was a little sluggish, but sitting for about 4 weeks, kinda expected that. There's only one thing.... I have a random misfire now. Definitely tweaking out when in 4th, at first, I'm thinking, better check trans fluid, but while driving it for a while, it did it at a dead stop, so I assume a little bit of old gas at this point, probably some moisture too. Threw some Isoheet and $40 worth of gas in it, probably will drive it tomorrow to work, see if it throws a specific misfire code or if it just clears up. Plugs only have 30k on them, but they are Autolites and I've never had luck with them in the past, and who knows, running rich on one side and lean on the other, maybe they are just fubar now. Boots are still good, and before the initial fire up today, they were all a normal looking white on both sides, so...

Updated the album with the rest of the pictures, and I'll post the startup video too. Again if no workie, I'll throw this on youtube...

https://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=10151135564739646
 
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