Been driving me mad...cant work out what it is.

Get a rubbing/rattle noise from the left hand cambelt cover at the top. Loud when engine bay cold, goes away when warm.

Took the cover off today, checked the clearance on the belt guide, all fine.

Started the car with the cover off, still get the noise, so its not the pulleys/belt rubbing on the housing.

odd thing is, if you apply a little pressure downwards on the housing, it goes away.

Any ideas? Or am i missing something very obvious?

 

Is there any way the moulding has been cracked, or that one of the bolts behind the cam wheels that holds it to the head have come loose?

Also when you say "left", do you mean looking from the front or from the steering wheel? If you mean the 2/4 bank. might be the rubber seal on the cam position sensor squeaking.

 

Just looked at some photos from another thread, re fitting a belt. There photos of a JGM engine, the belt sits flush with the edge of the pully. My belt sits about 2mm away from the edge, could this be whats rubbing?

 

i am having the same problem, and not sure what it is, when u rev the car it goes away tho, started it for the 1st time in 8months nw the new engine is in

 

No that shouldn't explain it. The belt is located by fences on opposite sides of the cam pulleys and has some built-in leeway to float a couple of mil. If it's rubbing on something, then that means the "something", whatever it is, shouldn't be there.

The only things that could possibly touch or rub against the belt (apart from the pulleys and idler wheels) are the guides fitted next to the crank, 2/4 exhaust and both 1/3 cam pulleys designed to stop the it jumping teeth. These guides should be adjusted to give 1mm of clearance. If one is too close you'll see marking on the half of the belt nearest the back of the car.

 

spot on, i fixed my banging noise and sqeezing. It was the cam guide, if i read this before hand it would of made it alot easier for me lol. Great advice

 

No sweat. Those fecking things are one of the reasons why it's worth taking the radiator off before changing the timing belt.

Also, whether the rad comes off or not, it's worth investing in a pair of 1mm drills, bits of 1mm piano wire, or similar, and use these to space out the guides when tightening them back up. Stick them in between the guide and belt, tighten the bolts, pull out the drills, you should have perfectly spaced guides. Next to impossible to get them right by any other method when the engine is in the car.

 

i stuck two screw drivers in the space, done the job, now jst got 2 worry about why its miss firing. Think am a coil pack down