Hello I am attempting to change the timing belts on my 308 myself and a mechanic friend of mine. We were looking for advice on correctly setting it and some tips if possible. Thanks. Brent.
Where to begin. WHen you removed the timing belts, did you make sure the engine is at top dead center? Where the marks on the cams lined up with the marks on the cam caps? DId you remove the cam covers? We need more specific questions
I haven't removed the belts yet, but will be attempting it. One of the belts seemed to have torn a little and slipped. I noticed a loss of power as soon as I pulled into the garage. I checked the belt and noticed some damage to it. No pings or bangs in the engine; Ran for 1 minute after the belt slipped. I have a shop manual but am looking for advice such as what you posted. Answers to little questions. Any tips on getting the marks set properly before I begin. Is it similar to most cars. Do you always replace the tensioner bearing? My Ferrari dealer said only if I need to. Do I have to remove the air conditioner to get good enough access. Thanks. Brent.
Always replace tensioner bearing and buy from Ricambi here a sponsor as there are conterfeit ones out now... AC will have to move but like a P911 can be unbolted and left hanging to avoid recharge.. There's some threds here or go to Birdman's website for a good narrative, you really should degree the cams and set to Euro specs for best performance but some folks just "clamp and go" like you are doing, we have seen guys use two vice grips tie wrapped at handles.....kind of brave on a 20K engine...LOL! Welcome man, a 'search' will bring up a gazzilion threads on timing belts...LOL!
It's rare for them to 'slip' a little..normally they are on or way off, but maybe you dodged a bullet.
This is great. I'm glad I signed up. I will try to look up a narrative on the birdman's site. A play by play would be very helpful Thanks again. Brent.
On my first Ferrari, the header exploded first thing out of the box.......I am just paying back an old debt..... You have stumbled in here and asked the "most asked question" though, except for "how did you guys get rich??" LOL! So get ready for the "Search Police" to arrive....... Heck, go ahead a Subscribe if you own the car, we discuss women and all kinds of things in the Private Section..ROTFLMAO! You can them post pictures and all kinds of extra stuff, I buy it for myself on my bithday every year.... Image Unavailable, Please Login
Hello Brent, There's a 2V belt change procedure at this web site, it & the 308gt4 & 328/QV WSMs in the Steve Jenkins site(see below) got me thru my 1st QV belt change: http://www.camerafilters.com/ec/ofsm.htm --------------------------------------------- I wrote this for another new member a couple of years ago,so some of the links may be stale. Still most of it should be good. Here are some pointers to other online resources that you'll probably find useful: 'Online Service Manual' - http://www.cameragear.com/ec/ 308 GTB Register TechTips - http://www.r-design.net/308/index_e.html Ferrari Club of America:Northwest Region Site: FerrariFAQ - http://www.ferrariclub.com/faq/ (Click on Ferrari FAQ & scroll down) FerrariList.com: DIY and Mechnical information and instructions - http://www.ferrarilist.com/?query=docs&action=catlist&cat=5 Forum: Technical/DIY - http://www.ferrarilist.com/forum/list.php?f=3 Also the FerrariList archives are searchable. Another, quite new, forum is: http://www.*****************/ Ferrari 308 FAQ - http://home.att.net/~ferrari/308faq1.htm Technical Articles and Writings by Tony Palladino - http://www.modena-motors.com/Technical%20Articles.htm SERVICE & PARTS MANUALS, SPECS & SERVICE BULLETINS: Private Ferrari Document Collection - http://ferrari.jenkins.org/books/ PARTS SOURCES The most comprehensive parts sorce is Ferrari.uk. A couple of years ago the Ferrari factory shipped them 51 TONS of 308 parts, the remaining end of life inventory. If they don't have something, then you'll be lucky to find it anywhere else. In general their prices are a lot better than buying thru a local Ferrari dealer. They're a FerrariChat sponsor, but their online catalog is only accessable via Ferrari's owners club: www.owners.ferrari.com You'll have to register with the site. Once youre in the site, keep clicking the 'spare parts' menu items & gadgets until you finally get to ferrari.uk's catalog. -------------------------------------------------------------- Search is your friend. Here's a fairly complete list of the reasonably long threads discussing cam belt replacement whys & how-tos. I remember several more significant discussions of the topic, but don't know why my search didn't turn them up. However, it's a start at an Index: Why does Ferrari still use cambelts? http://ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=111403 35,000 miles and 11+ years on belts! http://ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=97833 308 Cam Belt broke..... anyone wanna help http://ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=86341 308 Cam belts do Fail.... http://ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=88755 CAMBELT REPLACEMENT EXPOSED http://ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=64504 308 Cam Belt Change http://ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=56702 Cam Belt replacement http://ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=49430 Change timing belt w/o open cam cover??? http://ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=41307 http://ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=41306 Cam Belt Drive bearings http://ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=39746
Sorry but this scares me a little. Before replacing the belts be very sure nothing was affected by the "slip". It can happen but at the very least once the belts are on rotate the crank very slowly and be sure there is no binding. It is possible to have a bent valve...and best to scope the motor out before engaging in this. IMHO...better very safe than very sorry
Whatever happened, happened. Assuming it "looks okay" I'd be inclined to put it back together with new parts and hope for the best. If it has to come all apart later he'll know where a lot of the bolts are.
If the belt really slipped, be very careful cranking the engine. I'd suggest turning it by hand. These are high interference engines, meaning if the belt slips or breaks, the valves can hit the pistons and then you have a big mess. Try turning the engine over slowly and bring #1 up to TDC on the intake stroke. Then you can check the timing marks on the cams against the marks on the caps and see if one of the cams jumped at all. You and your mechanic friend should read the manual, read a bunch of the threads on here and proceed slowly. If he's experienced and knows how to time cams, you should be okay. After all, it's just a car. But there are a few tricks you can pick up from reading the threads on here (here it is, the Search Police -- Use the search function and you'll find a hundred threads on 308 belt changing). And make sure you find out about the cam locking tools that are available. Unless you are planning on doing a full timing job, checking valve lash, etc., you don't want to remove the belts without the cams locked down. Good luck and let us know how things go.
Really? So let's just do it and hope for the best, and if wrong...what the hey...it's only a few thousand K to get it right, yeh, that's cool
It is ... his car and ... his money. He seems to know the risks ... so, who am I to tell him something different? He seems to have a higher tolerance for risks than you and I are. Reminds me of a boss I used to have in the 80's. He bought one of the first Honda CRX for $6K, commuted in it for 100,000 miles, hardly changed the oil, cleaned or washed the car, and when it died, he threw it away and said ... for $6K no complaints. He knew the risk.
OK...I can go along with that...which reminds me, I haven't changed the oil in my Wife's Beetle in a while
Brent, I don't know how much you know about the 308 engine, but to get the timing right, you have to pull the cam covers and align the timing marks on the cams with the marks on the cam caps while the engine is at TDC. Since you know a belt sipped and the timing is off, this step is necessary. Then while you have the cam covers off, might as well check the valve clearances and adjust if necessary (will need shims). Then a new pair of belts and tensioner bearings, some gaskets and a few other expensive items, and button her back up. Remember....interference engine. Do not force anything when the timing is off or the belts are off. For example, if you rotate the engine to TDC then pull the cam covers and find one of the cams is way out, don't just turn it! Remove (or just loosen) the cam caps first so you aren't pushing on the valves as you set the cam to the right timing....you could force a valve into a piston. There are on-line electronic copies of the service manuals all over the place (Verell's link above) which will have proper torque numbers. Take your time and go slowly....it's a Ferrari overhead cam engine! Birdman
I just finished my first melt change/major service on my 77. I strongly recommend reading a lot of threads because everyone will have a few little (methods, tricks, proceedures), that other threads do not. By compiling all of these bits, you are doing yourself a big favor - you will find yourself a lot less stumped, little things like being very carefull with the tensioner bearings and pressing them on by ONLY applying force to the inner race, or the bearing will fall apart, time for a new bearing. I found that this is a time consuming proceedure and a lot of things have to be removed to get the job done. This leads to a long term mind set - do a carefull thorough job, ..."as long as i am in there, i might as well..." will crop up a lot. Before you tear into it look at the condition of the top of the engine for compnent condition. Review the service history on the engine work so you can plan on a timed replacement of things that don't last forever. Heck if the thing is off in your hands or the coolant is drained, why not replace the rubber coolant hoses, the thermostat, temp sender........... I ended up pulling the carbs and overhauling them, so i had a good known point for really tuning the engine. This made working on the valve adjustment a lot easier. I pulled the cams to replace one bad timing gear and do all of the cam seals. If you read the posts, you will find that there is a "better", two lip cam seal - got it from trutlands for like 19 each. I found that pulling the water pmp was the only way i could get the ac compressor around and up, so while it is off the car, i checked it carefully and it felt smooth, (the po had a pantera guy remachine the pump body for two outter bearings). When it was all done, i proceeded to my first track day and it ran like a watch, I was a very happy ferrari owner, (except for the collapsed fram filter...but that is another story). hth, chris
Hello I really appreciate all the advice. I spent last night reading all the threads I could find. Birdman, I appreciate your reply, your info is great. After reading everything, I am actually a little excited to get started. I feel that there is the possibility of making the engine perform better than before. I should be starting on Saturday (2 days from now). I have the belts and some gaskets, but I'm not sure everything I will need. My Ferrari dealer is 40 minutes away and open until 1:00pm on Saturday. I imagine I will be making a few trips. I have read some people reccomend a special tool to measure the angles and not just line up the marks. Do you guys think I will need it? Thanks. Brent.
Knowing your tolerance for risks, no you don't need a degree dial wheel. Just line up the marks and that is good enough for 98% of the people. You need: 1. Belts, tensioners, and likely accessories belts as well 2. Water pump gaskets and oring, and if you want to rebuild it, also water pump rebuild kit 3. Coolants, 2.5 gallons, plus 2.5 gallons of distilled water. I have never figured out how to do this without draining the coolant. 4. Valve cover gaskets, seals, if you want to do valve clearance checking. And if you find any needing to be adjusted, you need to BUY new shims. Or, reuse some old ones if you have them. Volvo dealers have the shims for the 2V Ferrari. The might as well list: a. Oil, filter, air filter b. Coolant hoses, all of them unless you have changed them in the last 10 years. c. Fuel hoses, all of them d. Rebuild your carbs (This is a carb car?) e. Replace timing gear seals if they leak, common. f. Replace main crank shaft front seal if it is leaking, less common, but does happen I think I'll stop there. The sky is the limit after that (replace points condensors with elec ignition, change 2 dizzies into 1, repaint the air box and coolant tank, scrub down the frame and polish the aluminum firewall, fix the rusted out trunk firewall, replace shocks, shock bushings, suspension bushings, repaint Control Arms, replace brake fluid, transmission fluid, redye seats, clean out the interior, grease and improve window motors, adjust parking brakes, replace vacuum line to the brakeb booster) I really have to stop now.
If you are thinking/know a belt slipped, I would do a leak-down test to see if there is any damage to the valves. You could even just remove the cams, thereby closing all the valves, and run a quick leak-down test on each cylinder that way. You will know if there is something wrong pretty quickly. Once you get the cam covers off, you will see if it slipped by checking out the cam cap marks as mentioned earlier. Good luck. jwise
Well, I think it's pretty muc agreed the cam marks are "rough' in regards to timing as opposed to the degree wheel, thats why you have all the holes in the drive gears. for fine tuning????
If you use the cam marks to set the cam timing, you must be very accurate in lining them up. "Close" can mean you are off by 5 or 10 degrees. The best way to do it is to degree the cams, but that's a major operation. You will see a notch in the cams and a notch in the cap at the belt end of the cams. At TDC on the intake stroke, assume they should line up perfectly unless you have degreed the cams and verified that they are off. Before lining up the cams, be sure that you are perfectly at TDC on the mark on the flywheel. Without a degree wheel on the crank, it's hard to verify exact TDC by piston movement, so you have to rely on the mark on the flywheel.
