Cam Timing Gear
 

I'm playing around with what looks like a jumped timing belt. The car is an 87 5K CSQT. I need some info on the cam timing gear. On the front side, away from the engine, the gear has a small dot stamped on one of the teeth. On the backside, near the engine, the the gear has a small line stamped on on of the teeth. The two marks are not on the same tooth and appear to have no correlation to each other. Neither mark lines up with the edge of the cylinder head but the engine turns freely-no apparent interference. I'm also chasing down some other gremlins but I would like to "understand" the cam gear. Thanks.

Paul

the one on the back is supposed to lineup on the driver's side of the valve cover at TDC.

Re: Cam Timing Gear
 

One way to figure this out is to turn the CRANKSHAFT to TDC. You could make sure by removing the #1 sparkplug and stick your finger on top of the opening to feel compression. After that's done, take note of where the #1 plug wire is, take off the distributor cap and turn the camshaft until the rotor points somewhere close to the #1 plug wire. Assuming that your timing belt only jumped a tooth, it should be fairly easy.

Hope that helps.

Wilson.