i purchased a 2000 ford focus to resell, i paid $400 for the car KNOWING it had a bad timing belt, i paid a good mechanic friend of mine $200 to replace the timing belt and any parts that will need replaced while replacing the timing belt.

he replaced two timing belt idler pulleys and another belt pulley, he also replaced a engine mount too.

he used the TDC pin for the crank, and he used the cam hold down tool that sits the cams.

upon putting the stuff back together and firing up the car, the car wont idle, just sputter, if you hold the gas down it will fire up and run at 3000+ RPM and run pretty smooth other than slightly slow revs, but once the RPM's drop down it wont run at all, at 3000 RPM, the cat, downpipe and exhaust manifold all glow red, he told me that the cat could be plugged, so i removed the EGR port tube from the manifold to give it alittle breathing room (a 1" hole in the manifold) and that didnt help at all.

i have 180PSI compression on all 4 cylinders, the mechanic says that with 180 PSI on all 4 cylinders there is absolutely no way that the timing could be off, im not sure if thats true or not, he's willing to look at it again, but id rather be certain that timing is what we are looking for, i dont want him to waste his time, and i dont want to be the one to waste his time.

matthew

Sounds like timing is off, but I'll let the real mechanics handle this.

Brad

anyone know their ford engines?

matthew

If the cat and exhaust are glowing red, doesn't that mean you have a lean condition? Thats what I have been told on here before. Seems to make sense too, being that you have to give it more gas to keep it running. Sounds like a fuel related issue, but I am not one of the more savvy diagnostic guys around here. So consider this a friendly bump and maybe it will get somebody else thinking about it.

Jim

How many miles are on the car? It is possible that the cats are cloged.

quote Originally posted by Small town fool: How many miles are on the car? It is possible that the cats are cloged.

with the EGR port removed at the manifold, it gives the exhaust a bypass incase the cat is plugged, so ive ruled the cat out, its fine, the car revs up fine from 3000-5500 RPM, so i wouldnt think it would have a fuel issue, or i would atleast think it would be able to sustain a lower RPM as well.


im completely lost on it though.

I'd be more than willing to bet that the timing is off. 180 psi on the cylinders seems high (not too certain on ford engines though) considering most cars are 160 to 165psi for normal compression. The other reason I say it sounds timing related is because it seems to be running lean. Timing controls your spark and fuel mix. Me thinks your spark timing is advanced too far and the fuel can't keep up with it. I can't explain it any better, maybe someone else can chime in and put it in better words than me.

Just my 2 cents worth. Again, this is based on my knowledge of other vehicles and not ford...

Edit: The other thing to check would be your valves. You said you bought it with a bad timing belt. Was the belt slipped, broken, etc? Could need a valve job in that case. Could also cause a lean/rich condition if the valves aren't opening/closing properly. I'd suggest pulling the heads and getting them checked out. If the valves aren't bent, at least its a good opportunity to do a 3 angle valve grind and clean everything up..

[This message has been edited by Xerces_Blackthorne (edited 04-02-2010).]

Is the engine a Zetec, SPI or SVT?

Most likely it's the Zetec or SPI (Zetec has plastic valve cover, SPI has a metal one).

Zetec's and SPI's are non-interference type engines, so a broken timing belt can't mess up your valvetrain.

You may want to verify the connection at the MAF is good. A quick visual inspection of the metered air side of the induction system would be another place to quickly check, and see if extra air is getting in your engine, causing the lean coundition/rough running.

I have a 2000 Focus, with a Zetec, and had a wire chafing issue on the engine wiring harness (right around the coilpack) and the damaged wiring went to the MAF which caused idling issues, etc. I didn't let it go long enough to see if the header turned red.

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86 Fiero 2.5L, 5spd.
00 Ford Focus 2.0L 5spd
66 Chevrolet C10 250 cid, Powerglide
04 Suzuki GSX-R600

This was some six months ago and it was on a 2001, so could be different. I'm assuming you have a DOHC Zetec motor?

When I did the timing belt on mine I didn't use the crank pin tool when I did the timing belt, and I also didn't use a conventional cam locking tool either. I don't think you're in time, possibly 180 out. I'm not entirely certain the method I used on mine will be any good to you, I was concerned with keeping the cams in time, not finding out if they were in time.

If you take off the valve cover, on the backside of both cams there are straight grooves on both cams. They're off-center so that you can lock the cams with a machinists straight edge or I used a thin screwdriver. anyways, when they are lined up and you are able to lock them up with a straight edge you're at TDC cyl #1 Compression. When the grooves are lined up and you can't get a straight edge inside (cyl head will obstruck it) you're at TDC cyl #1 Exhaust.

As for the Crank I used a timing mark on the engine block right off the crank sprocket. There was a tooth off the crank sprocket that lined up perfectly with a small bump in the casting of the engine block (hard to find, but is obviously for timing). I painted the tooth on the sprocket and used that to make sure that everything was in time.

These aren't interference motors and compression is good, so I have doubts about valves being colpret. I did have an issue with the connector to the coil packs literally fell apart (50 F'n dollars for a pigtail from ford!). A week later I was replacing the coilpacks. But It sounds like timing to me. Do you have any fault codes?

hope this helps.

[This message has been edited by Tumble weed (edited 04-02-2010).]

no fault codes as of yet, ill check the coil pack wiring tomorrow, i found it funny that i could move the spark plug wires to any position and the car would run exactly the same.

matthew

does anyone know if its even possible to have 180 PSI in all 4 cylinders if the timing is off?

matthew

bump