Fiesta 1.25 Zetec? Rough idle & thirsty

[Hooli]

Mrs Hooli has a '57 plate 1.25 Fiesta.

Last october the heater hose sliced itself open on the fan bracket dumping the water on the M1. This blew the headgasket before the car was stopped. When the car was recovered home I sorted the pipe & filled it with water to see what else was wrong. This was when we found the system pressurised once the engine was at temp & under load. At this time it run fine, smooth idle etc etc
It was given to a mechanic Mrs Hooli's mate knows to do the head gasket & came back running like a sack of ste, very rough idle to the point it nearly stalled & massively down on power. We obviously took it back & he claimed it was the gasket under the throttle body when he returned the car still running as bad. Not only that on later investigation I found he'd only tightened two of the bolts holding the throttle body down!

Other things I've found since are several broken lugs on the airbox from abuse trying to fit/remove it. I've stripped down the inlet side of the engine & found the following -
The throttle body loose as mentioned above
The inlet manifold was tightened right up at one end first so sat off square on the head, plus dirty grease under where the rubber ring gaskets should seal
Damaged wiring that only appears to be the outer cover damaged under the inlet manifold
Various other bits of wire not in clips etc
So in general a crap job by an idiot who claims to have done it well.

We've given up trying to get him to fix it, indeed with what I've seen I wouldn't let him touch it again anyway. I'm just lost what to try next on fixing it, the current symptoms are
When first started it revs to nearly 3k before dropping to idle
After 10-15secs of idle it starts to hunt, the idle varies between about 600-1000rpm on the dial
Fuel consumption is up by about 25% to before
The car is generally down on power
When driven slowly in the lower gears it surges exactly as it does at idle, which suggests to me it's all one issue

Any suggestions where to start looking to solve this?
I've fixed all these & it has improved.

[Iang84]

If hes damaged the airbox he may have damaged the MAF sensor/wiring as well

[Hooli]

Is it possible to check the MAF sensor? I don't recall anything else looking damaged, but tbh at this time of the morning I can't even recall where the MAF sensor is.

[Iang84]

It will be on the engine side of the airbox a multi plug on the plastic pipe unplug it, the ecu will use a basic airflow formula so if the revs stop hunting hes knackered the sensor/cable lots of people tend to pull on the wires rather than the multi plug which obviously damages the connectors

Other than that I couldnt really help you without sticking my head under the bonnet

[Mr2Mike]

The muppet has almost certainly got the cam timing wrong.

[Limpet]

Mr2Mike said:

The muppet has almost certainly got the cam timing wrong.

This.

I haven't worked on one this late, but the earlier 1.25 and 1.4 needed the cams timed with plates in the tails after removing the cam cover. The pulleys are neither marked or keyed to the shafts, and the belt is actually tensioned with the pulleys loose and free to rotate. Bet he's tried to shortcut this and something's moved a tooth as he's tensioned it up.

[Nick1point9]

Limpet said:

Mr2Mike said:

The muppet has almost certainly got the cam timing wrong.

This.

I haven't worked on one this late, but the earlier 1.25 and 1.4 needed the cams timed with plates in the tails after removing the cam cover. The pulleys are neither marked or keyed to the shafts, and the belt is actually tensioned with the pulleys loose and free to rotate. Bet he's tried to shortcut this and something's moved a tooth as he's tensioned it up.

Ford donated a load of these engines to my university, IIRC there is no marking between pulley and cam shaft, nor is there a key. The pulley is simply bolted to the end of the camshaft and ford wrecked about 1 in 20 of the engines on fire up (pulley spins but not cam). They then donated them to the university.

[Limpet]

Nick1point9 said:

Limpet said:

Mr2Mike said:

The muppet has almost certainly got the cam timing wrong.

This.

I haven't worked on one this late, but the earlier 1.25 and 1.4 needed the cams timed with plates in the tails after removing the cam cover. The pulleys are neither marked or keyed to the shafts, and the belt is actually tensioned with the pulleys loose and free to rotate. Bet he's tried to shortcut this and something's moved a tooth as he's tensioned it up.

Ford donated a load of these engines to my university, IIRC there is no marking between pulley and cam shaft, nor is there a key. The pulley is simply bolted to the end of the camshaft and ford wrecked about 1 in 20 of the engines on fire up (pulley spins but not cam). They then donated them to the university.

Indeed, there is no marking or key. The pulleys can be fitted to the cams in any position - the timing is marked and set on the cams themselves. The pulleys grip the shaft via a tapered joint which is forced together when the pulley retaining bolt is torqued up. The torque of the securing bolt is critical - too loose and the pulley will slip or spin on the shaft with disastrous consequences which is probably what happened here. The taper is strong though once correctly torqued. When you slacken the retaining bolt, it takes quite a belt on the back of the pulley with a hammer and drift to separate the pulley from the camshaft.

It's a good system if it's worked on correctly. By leaving the pulleys free to rotate as you apply tension to the belt, it ensures the tension is applied across the whole belt rather than just one side of it. But it isn't muppet proof, and does require proper timing pins and plates rather than relying on marks. I suspect a lot of people break out the Tipp-Ex and chance it.

[Sardonicus]

Limpet said:

Indeed, there is no marking or key. The pulleys can be fitted to the cams in any position - the timing is marked and set on the cams themselves. The pulleys grip the shaft via a tapered joint which is forced together when the pulley retaining bolt is torqued up. The torque of the securing bolt is critical - too loose and the pulley will slip or spin on the shaft with disastrous consequences which is probably what happened here. The taper is strong though once correctly torqued. When you slacken the retaining bolt, it takes quite a belt on the back of the pulley with a hammer and drift to separate the pulley from the camshaft.

It's a good system if it's worked on correctly. By leaving the pulleys free to rotate as you apply tension to the belt, it ensures the tension is applied across the whole belt rather than just one side of it. But it isn't muppet proof, and does require proper timing pins and plates rather than relying on marks. I suspect a lot of people break out the Tipp-Ex and chance it.

No keyway location on the crank sprocket either it's no problem as long as tightening techniques/rules are applied IMO in fact I like this engine

[Limpet]

Yup me too. Genuine 100k belt life as well. Which is longer than timing chains last on a lot of modern engines, eh BMW?

[Hooli]

Oh great! That doesn't sound fun to sort out. Is it fixable at home or are the tools to do it expensive? How long does it take to do, ie would it be cheaper to pay a real garage to check than buy the tools?

I've not found a manual for this car yet so I don't know if it's as easy as cam cover off & look at marks to check the timing or if it's more involved?

Thanks for the ideas so far.

[Limpet]

Take the cam cover off, and look at the tails of the cams (opposite ends to the pulleys). You will see 5mm (approx) wide slots machined into them. The cams should reach a position where both slots are horizontal and inline with each other, and you can slide a piece of 5mm plate into both at the same time. This should correspond with cylinder 1 being at TDC. You are supposed to use a timing pin screwed into the crankcase which engages with a web on the crankshaft. I daresay using a dial gauge in no 1 cylinder to find TDC would be good enough in the absence of the tools.

This might explain it a bit more sensibly than I did

http://www.lasertools.co.uk/items/pdf/Products/434...

The proper tools are 15 quid on the 'bay. And you'll probably get something back for them when you're finished.

Edited by Limpet on Thursday 20th June 09:47

Edited by Limpet on Thursday 20th June 09:47

[Hooli]

Cheers Limpet, I'll take a look when I've got chance, doesn't sound too bad to do.

[Jimmyarm]

Before you start playing about with the timing, get a can of carb cleaner and spray it around the intake system (manifold, vacuum pipes etc).

Given that you have already highlighted various leaks (manifold, throttle body) I'd be looking for a leak in the inlet tract before checking timing

[Hooli]

Jimmyarm said:

Before you start playing about with the timing, get a can of carb cleaner and spray it around the intake system (manifold, vacuum pipes etc).

Given that you have already highlighted various leaks (manifold, throttle body) I'd be looking for a leak in the inlet tract before checking timing

Been there, done that. Cured them, which made it drive-able but still not right.

[Hooli]

Bumping this up as I finally got time to check the cams. I looks like the moron we paid got this wrong too. This pic with with No1 at TDC.



I also found a missing bolt in the timing belt cover & the belt cover is almost snapped in half. It's untrue how much damage a so called professional has done to this car, he must have broken enough bits to make it he owes us money before the labour of repairing it all!

Anyway, how do I retime the cams on this engine? I'll have to buy the locking tools mentioned earlier in the thread, but it sounds different to normal with the taper fit pulleys etc.

ETA: Rereading the thread sort of answers this, but I couldn't see how to get the cam cover off as the waterpump pulley was in the way. I assume that's got to come off & probably the bottom pulley too?
I might just give it to a local garage I trust & who know these engines (they run a championship winning Formula Ford team).

Edited by Hooli on Saturday 6th July 11:45

[Nick1point9]

Hooli said:

I might just give it to a local garage I trust & who know these engines (they run a championship winning Formula Ford team).

Formula fords don't run a 1.25 shopping car engine

[Mr2Mike]

They are a piece of cake to time properly. Once you loosen both the cam pulley bolts the cams are free to turn independent of the crank, so you lock the crank into the cam timing position with the tool, loosen the pulley bolts and then use the other tool to align the two slots at the end of the cams and then tighten the pulley bolts. You should use a proper pulley holding tool to tighten and loosen against, you can't tighten the bolts against the locking tool.

You are supposed to replace the cam pulley bolts as well, but very few people bother IME.

Quite honestly it takes a ham fisted baboon to get this wrong, but unfortunately you seem to have employed one I would go right through the whole belt replacement and check all bolts and redo the belt tension since there's bound to be something else this pillock has screwed up.

Ford Workshop Manual

[Hooli]

Nick1point9 said:

Hooli said:

I might just give it to a local garage I trust & who know these engines (they run a championship winning Formula Ford team).

Formula fords don't run a 1.25 shopping car engine

From chatting to them, it seems the engines they do run are a bigger version of this (at least in a lot of ways)? I dunno but they are a proper garage who actually fix stuff.

Mr2Mike said:

They are a piece of cake to time properly. Once you loosen both the cam pulley bolts the cams are free to turn independent of the crank, so you lock the crank into the cam timing position with the tool, loosen the pulley bolts and then use the other tool to align the two slots at the end of the cams and then tighten the pulley bolts. You should use a proper pulley holding tool to tighten and loosen against, you can't tighten the bolts against the locking tool.

You are supposed to replace the cam pulley bolts as well, but very few people bother IME.

Quite honestly it takes a ham fisted baboon to get this wrong, but unfortunately you seem to have employed one I would go right through the whole belt replacement and check all bolts and redo the belt tension since there's bound to be something else this pillock has screwed up.

Ford Workshop Manual

Excellent link, thanks. My google skills failed to find that site.

I agree with the rest of it, I would do it from scratch to make sure it's right. Pisses me right off that I could have done this right first time but paid a 'professional' to make life easy only to get all this hassle.

I think the final choice will depend on the price I get off the garage on monday in all honesty, I'm busy enough sorting my car out at the weekends as the MOT is approaching.

[Hooli]

Update.

The car came back from the garage today & appears sorted

Cheers for all the ideas & stuff guys, seemed you diagnosed it right