Removal and replacement of timing chain

Everyone told me no sealer is needed. The cover is on and bolted in with most of the bolts, not torqued and no loctite was used so it won't be hard to remove them if nessecary. The smaller bolts confused me because of the number I took out vs. what the service manual says vs. what new bolts i got. Im not sure if I have enough bolts or not, pretty sure I dont.

 

Hey Rob
you just need sealer on the bolts that go into the water jacket. I have taps if you need them.

 

Davy, I'll need those taps too. Thanks.

 

Just give me a call when your ready.

 

Thanks a ton Davy! Bob came over today and helped me get some of the timing cover issues solved. I problem was the threads may have been just slightly different and that the bolts from TA were wrong. Wow talk about bad luck, almost everything I got from TA was to long. :error: Glad its fixed now and that I didn't have to remove the timing cover. Thanks again Bob, especially for putting up with the less than perfect conditions in my garage. I can see the finish line! :grin:

 

No problem Rob thanks for the kind words. Now get your but in gear and get that boat on the road :spank:

 

Got some time in today. After waking up at 11, (I planned to wake up earlier :grin: ) I walked over to NAPA and got some hi temp black paint for all the black parts of the engine. I then got a few parts out of the pile and trunk that needed to be painted. Got the cam pulleys, big and small out and painted, finnally finished stripping all the old paint and oil off of the passenger side valve cover and painted that too. Dug up the coil from the pile of parts and after cleaning away TONS of oil, to my amazement its the original coil with 150K on it. Woohoo! :grin: Repainted that black and left the holder for it bare metal for now as it should be. Cleaned the fuel line and removed all the oil from it, then put the new fuel pump and original line on. Painted a few small parts on the intake for the carb. Not going to rebuild the original carb yet, going to take the rebuilt carb off the parts car and put that on. Still need to paint the crank pulley and knock a weight out of the harmonic balancer without damaging the new paint. Im thinking of clearcoating some parts, like my valve covers because they don't look as shiny as other ones of here? o No: Cleaned and organized the garage a bit, now I can find my tools. Also removed a few parts off the parts car for people. I felt like I made some progress today, and it looks like it in the garage for once.


Not quite done yet.

 

How much slack was there in the old timing chain, in comparison to the new one? In that 73 Electra I found at the yard, it felt like there was a lot. Like it was almost hanging a bit at the bottom. you could move 2/3 of an inch side to side on the middle.

 

The old was never bolted up when I got it so I never knew how good/bad it was. Although I have my theories that it was replaced very recently before it the bolts came loose and because it had just been replaced the owner ditched rather than fixing something twice. I never did check the new one for slack, I forgot. ou: But if I remember it was pretty tight. I just hope those bolts hold and everything goes right.

 

Finally got a break in the weather and the high was 41*F. :bglasses: Nothing great but better than the past few weeks.

Installed the new ported vacuum switch, heater control valve, thermostat w/ gasket and housing, choke control and put on the rebuilt carb. Im very glad I took a second look at the carb on the parts car because it was in fact rebuilt. So I saved $299 today. :grin: I know its a good carb because I've driven the car it was on and it looks clean like Frank's (austingta) carb. I would have made more progress today like hooking up and routing all new hoses but didnt have a ride. I still need to hook up the throttle (but have to figure out how to remove it from the bracket first), paint all the brackets for the power steering and alternator, clean the heads some more, clean the wiring harness, and install a few more things. I test fitted the valve covers too just to see how nice the engine would look and it looked so sweet! I can't wait! :grin: No pics for you guys though. :moonu: :moonu:

 

Got the new heater hoses, clamps and heater control valve assembled at work today, and finished up the paint on the valve covers. The high-temp clear coat is on the valve covers and it helps the shine tremendously! Its incredible how shiny they are now. Now for the rest of the engine parts. :bglasses:

 

Alternator bracket upper and lower, power steering bracket, original coil, cam pulleys and crank pulley. :bglasses: :grin:

 

Thanks! Yea, bitter cold is right, and its supposed to get worse. Not sure what happened to our 50-degree days but I know its 65 degrees at work and I painted and got paid doing it. :Brow:

 

Hopefully this week or next week I will venture back into the engine bay. Im pulling the timing cover again to replace the new rope seal with a new neoprene seal, replace the pan gasket as it was misaligned when I first put it on so the bolts did not line up right and I didnt seal the main timing cover gasket that mates it with the block. Also I'll use a better thread sealer on the bolts that go into the heads. Im not mad about this at all, just preventing further headaches. I will also be dropping the pan to inspect the bottom end, get anything dirt that might have fallen down, and most of all the oil pickup tube. That will take some planning though. :bglasses: The only bad part is dropping $175 for the new full stainless brake lines, but I have to look at it as an investment in the future. :beer

 

Got the cover back off yesterday, took about 20 minutes. Sent it to the local auto parts store and they managed to install the new neoprene seal easily. But I have one question, my harmonic blancer has small ridges in it that normally with a rope seal would not matter but now it with the neoprene seal those ridges will tear it up. My questions is if I need to get rid of those ridges in the harmonic balancer, is this what other people needed to do? o No: Thanks

 

Rob,
you should be able to get a sleeve for the balancer.
they make them specifically for that reason.