Well, I had some fine the last two weeks. Crash course in Intro to Diesel Mechanics. So, it started by changing a water pump. Which had its own interesting turn. I was working in the dark and didn't inspect the bolts closely, and broke one off in the engine block. Ended up being a best case scenario for an easy out tool, no biggie, but the previous owner had over tightened all of them and I was lucky to have only had one break off. New bolts and the pump was on.
Checked my timing, replaced cover, power steering pump, pulleys, belts, and fan. I go to start, did it's normal thing and cranked over to start on a half key turn, then stops. Then spins when I turn the key.
being a novice I assumed it was from poor work when putting on the water pump. My buddy walks me through a diagnostic of anything I could have done wrong or another simple solution. No answers so I take the top timing case off.
Cam sprocket is off time by 8 teeth. Injection pump is on time. I go to manual turn the engine 360 degrees. I hit a hard spot.
I then remove the valve cover and begin to inspect. Cam cap 1 (very front with three bolts) and 4 (1 before the back) are cracked around the threaded portion for mounting the rocker arms.
i remove the rocker arms by loosening the adjusters screws, then the mounting bolts, and remove a chunk of cap #4. I try to rotate the engine, it cycles and turns smooth.
There is one truck within a 100miles in a salvage, my buddy went by there, happens to be close to his job, and he got the cam caps, all in good condition. I went ahead and placed an order for a timing kit with both belts and both tensioners. I purchased a torque wrench along with some other stuff I needed, a feeler tool and a more complete set of metric wrenches. The torque wrench was needed for the specifics of this type of job, the most crucial part of a vehicle I have touched to date.
i got the caps (note: I already had the rocker arm from this truck in spare parts, my buddy had pulled it preemptively before selling me the truck) Saturday and pulled off all of the old ones. When doing so I found the likely source of the breakdown. Cap #2 had been stripped on the rocker arm mount creating play. The caps we pulled all had the hollow dowl on the caps, and all of them had been left in the engine from caps I pulled. I used needle nose vice grips and carefully twisty pulled them out.
i then lubed up each cap and put them on in order, setting them with a rubber mallet then prepping the bolts with anti-seize lube and hand tightening them to snug. Then set my torque wrench to 14ft lbs and cranked them down to specs.
i then went to inspecting my rocker arm and shaft options.
The one I pulled off the truck seemed fine till I got to the middle two rockers. Major resistance in either direction when attempting to remove them. My suspicions were confirmed, the incident had bent it. I put the rockers and springs back on in order and wrapped the bent shaft in paper towels for parts storage.
The other shaft and rockers seemed to be in great shape, I cleaned them well with brake cleaner and began to live the shaft and arms and place them back on in order.
I took it out to the truck and set in place and worked my wa down positioning the arms and setting the shaft. I had to back off the set screws as I went to get a perfectly flat connection. I used anti seize on the mounting bolts and hand tightened to snug. I then set the torque wrench to 26ft lbs and tightened to specs.
I have tomorrow to read about timing and valve lash setting, timing kit should arrive in 2 days. Any advice heading into that or other things I should check for before I try to crank it up again would be greatly appreciated. I am a novice by all accounts.
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Originally Posted by skullzaflare
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