I swapped my crow-cam for an XR6 the other day to see if there was any difference, started it up, drove it (gently to warm it up) to the end of the streeet, then it died!
The thing would crank over nicely, but no spark or signal to the injectors! The NRMA guy came to the same conclusion who towed me to Dynotune, who told me that the gear that drives the alternator shaft wasn't turning when the car was cranked, so I think I've done something (overtighted the chain tensioner?) when changing the cam...
Does anyone have any information on any part of the distributor drive gears? Is there an easy way to change it, and would I have done any damage? There's no grinding/scraping/nasty noises when it's being cranked, but I might be missing something!
Gear driving alternator shaft? Do you mean distributor? Does an EL have a distributor? My EF doesn't. How could you overtighten the tensioner?
I'm having a little trouble actually working this scenario out.
So why did you tow it to Dynotune when you were only at the end of your street? You should have got it back to your place and pulled the lid off it to see what you'd done yourself.
Was it a new cam? Did you lube the lobes before installing? Did you run it in properly before driving the car? The results can be the same but the symptoms are different to what you've described.
If there is no signal to the injectors or plugs you have an ECU/crank position sensor problem. The NRMA guy should've known how to diagnose this at the roadside and then advised you that you need to be at a Ford workshop where proper engine diagnosis equipment is available.
I'd be checking crank sensor first - you may have just loosened/knocked either the mounting or wiring - something which didn't fall off until that short drive shook it.
Again, even Dynotune should pick this up just about straight away.
I6's have roller rockers - so lubing and running in properly isn't so critical.
The EL went back to dizzy from the EF style coil pack setup - also, even the EF still has the dizzy drive setup - which is a gear driven at the front of the engine by the timing chain - but it runs a gizmo in the dizzy location that generates PIP signal (for the injection and ignition).
Unfortunately this sounds very similar to what happened to me when the cam gear bolt broke and the gear fell off (resulted in 7/12 valves bent and one broken rocker).
Yes they do have a dizzi and the gear is made of a nice white metal designed to break when anything goes wrong. You can replace the gear easy enough by just pulling dizzie knocking the roll pin out and putting on a new drive gear and roll pin. Try getting the broken gear teeth out with one of those telescopic wand magnets (looks like a broken radio antenna) but the relatively small risk is broken teeth have gotten into the oil pump and locked that up so try and turn the oil pump with a hex driive on a 3/8" socket extension before replacing the dizzie.
If the pump is locked up its time to take the sump off and perhaps even think about an engine rebuild depending on how much of the broken teeth you can find.
Drain the oil and change the filter ASAP and remeMber you have set up at TDC to put the dizzie back in.
Thanks for the replies everyone - sorry about the confusing story!
The reason I took it to Dynotune was because I'm pretty ordinary when it comes to anything electrical in an engine - I don't even own a multimeter. There they tried replacing the distributor, but then rang back to say that the shaft running from the timing chain to the distributor shaft wasn't turning, which would be the cause of the problem, and that I was looking at a minimum of $2-3 thou minimum for them to fix the problem. After that I got it towed home where it is at the moment.
So far, I've swapped the crow cam back out from the XR6 that donated the cam into the EL, and so far have removed everything from the front of the motor except the harmonic balancer (which I'll do tomorrow morning) ready to take the timing chain cover off and survey the damage.
The cams were lubed up when they were swapped both times, and neither have any signs of scuff marks on the lobes or journels, so hopefully they're OK...
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