Replacing A Timing Belt On A 1999 Fiesta 1.25 Zetec

[pbmitchell]

Hello Guys (and possibly gals).

I'm attempting to replace the timing belt on my 1999 Fiesta 1.25 Zetec and it's right pain in the rear bumper I can tell you. Whatever happened to cars that had a bit of space around the engine and all its components?

I have the Ford Workshop Manual but the diagrams are not always easy to interpret as I don't know which part of the engine I looking at.

Anyway, I'm currently trying to remove the crankshaft pully and it appears to be (almost) welded in place.

I have a set of timing tools - camshaft bar, crankshaft locking pin and crankshaft timing pin - and my lengthy studying and interpretation of the diagrams suggests the locking pin (303-748) goes in the back of the engine (as viewed from the front of the vehicle) and the timing pin (303-507) goes in the front. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

1) Can I use the locking pin to hold the crank still while I pull like Hell on the crankshaft nut?

If not, how can I get the pulley off?

2) The locking pin will only go a little way into the rear entrance hole. I've moved the crank a little and it still won't go in. Any advice would be appreciated.

3) I know I have to move the power steering pump 10mm in order to get the timing cover off but, having looked at the diagram and seen three nuts, I can't find those nuts on the actual engine.

All hejp, advice and (mild) abuse greatfully received.

[georgen]

Never done one to fiesta but to question 1. Dont do that. if you have car jacked up and wheel off etc, use straight bar and socket and hit it hard with hammer to shock it, if its never been out it will be tight, you should see if you can lend a impact gun as this would be better but would need a good one to remove that bolt. if its down on its wheels and you can get to pulley, put car in gear and handbrake on with wheel chocked, using a crack bar do your worst.

[wase16ll]

locking pin is designed for purpose, so yes you can use the locking pin to undo the pulley

(NOT the timing pin}

are you trying to fit the locking pin at TDC as thats not where its located..just keep turning crank slowly till it fits...tbh, ive never used it so cant help in exact position youll find it.

take it you mean the pas mounting bracket nuts...cant help from memory but they are there..only needs to be moved if engine has AC iirc

[pbmitchell]

I think disaster may have struck.

I continued trying inserted the locking pin into the hole at the rear of the engine while slowly turning the crank clockwise and indeed there came a position in which the pin could be inserted fully and screwed-in finger tight.

I then proceeded to rotate the crank ant-clockwise, expecting to find a position in which it would lock against the pin and become immovable in that direction of rotation.

In fact there was no such point to be found. The crank never offered more than mild resistance to rotation. As I turned it, the resistance went from 'compression-only' to 'something a little more resistant' to 'compression-only' to 'something a little more resistant' and so on. At no point did I exert more than a relatively mild pull on the spanner.

The snag is that the locking pin will now not come out.

I can turn it back and forth anti-clockwise and clockwise about 90 degrees and i hear a light metallic clunk at the end of its travel. If I do that while rotating the crank anti-clockwise, the pin becomes stuck (non-rotatable) when the crank moves with a little increased difficulty before moving freely again and allowing the pin to rotate back and forth through 90 degrees again.

As an experiment, I then turned the crank clockwise and it does at one point lock solid against the pin.

My impression is that turning the crank anticlockwise against the pin has bent ithe pin and rendered it non-unscrewable because it's now catching on something, although it's not clear how the pin can withstand massive force from the crank when the crank moves clockwise (to tighten the nut) but bends under relatively mild pressure when the crank is turned anti-clockwise and not much force used to turn it futher when it contacts the pin.

There is no point in the crank's rotation at which the pin will move more than stated above.

Sadly, common sense dictates that if rotating the pin makes it contact something inside the crankcase the pin cannot be straight because, if it were straight, its edges would remain at the same height regardless of its rotation.

I'll take off the sump and have a look.

Meanwhile, any and all advice/comments deeply appreciated.

[wase16ll]

cant make much sense of this

if youve not found a point where you can lock the crank to be able to undo, how can the pin have got bent..

as said ive never used one, but i was under impression that correct placing of pin will actually stop engine rotating either way, dont know if anyone can confirm this?

seriously dont know how you can bend that pin with , thats a solid pin that popeye and brutus would struggle to do... unless its been made from really crap metal...very strange

[pbmitchell]

The pin is the locking pin from a brand new Laser timing tools set so I doubt it's crap.

I made sure the pin was screwed fully into the crankcase before turning the crank.

As I was turning the crank slowly anti-clockwise, I was expecting it to contact the pin and stop dead in its tracks. However, what happened is that it stopped being easy to turn and became a little less easy (but nowhere near difficult) to turn and then became easy to turn again . . . then a litle less easy.... then easy.... and so on as i continued to rotate it. At no point was the crank difficult to turn with one hand on a spanner.

It seems to me that the crank has somehow 'brushed' the pin and bent it and is continuing to brush it on every revolution as I rotate it.

Whatever's happened, the fact is that if you stick a straight cylindrical bar into something and rotate the bar on its axis, the bar can't while rotating touch anything that it isn't touching all the time as no point on the bar's surface is further from its axis than is any other point. The pin must be bent.

My only hope, as far as I can see, is to remove the sump and see what's happening to the pin and the crank.

The snag is that I don't know how to remove the dipstick tube from the sump. There's no visible device holding it in place at the sump so my best guess is that it passes through an O-ring and thus just pulls straight out. If anyone can confirm that, I'd be grateful as I don't want to dig myself any deeper than I aleady am.

What a life, eh?

[wase16ll]

still confused, you wont bend that pin with one hand turning the crank???

[georgen]

Thats why I said no, its a slim chance that something goes wrong but if it does the headache is this sometimes them bolts seemed to be welded in there that tight. it sounds like its bent and slipping over hole, but when you turn the other way its hitting the pin on its end and so is solid, you now have to find a way of getting the pin free without damaging the hole, I would as you have mentioned take sump off to get a better look and access where to go from then. I hope you get your break mate and lady luck gives you a break and a quick simple solution is found.

[wase16ll]

as said, have never used them, so its hard to comment on the hows and whys of what appears to have happened..the locking pin is for loosening/tightening pulley so your talking upto 200nm pressure, so really cant see how it bends with mild hand pressure...i can see timing pin bending if forced but not locking pin.

to get round any further problerm, remove the starter and lock the flywheel ring gear, may need another pair of hands but saves any further grief with pin

[pbmitchell]

As I say, I haven't seen the pin (as I can't get it out of the crankcase hole) and I agree completely that these pins are built to withstand huge forces and so are unlikely to be bent by me pulling casually on a spanner with one hand.

All I can do at the moment is repeat that the pin did not (and still does not) stop the crank from rotating anti-clockwise. It simply made (and still makes) its passage a bit tight at a certain section of its rotation. However, if I rotate the crankshaft clockwise, it comes to an abrupt halt at one point, as if it's run into an immovable barrier - which it has, of course, as the locking pin is working as it should.

It's perhaps noteworthy that the Ford workshop manual tells us to use the locking pin when tightening the crankshaft pulley but doesn't give us any instructions at all when it comes to loosening it. Do they know something they should be telling us about the use of the locking pin for that purpose??

In any event, if I figure out how to take the dipstick tube out of the sump, I'll drop the sump and see what's actually happened to the locking pin.

[pbmitchell]

The sump is off and, having removed an inner plate, I could see the locking pin - and it was bent at angle of about 45 degrees.

So, armed with a hammer and a suitable steel rod I carefully battered the thing back to straightness and was finally able to unscrew it and remove it.

Thank God in his mercy for allowing me success in this little venture!

I think the problem might lie in the angle at which the crankshaft contacts the locking pin when going anti-clockwise.

Anyway, as soon as I've replaced the sump, I'll be back to where I was a couple of days ago - faced with getting the crankshaft pulley bolt off.

Onwards and upwards!

[pbmitchell]

More good news.

I haven't replaced the sump because, with the sump off, I have access to the starter ring so: using a flat-bladed screwdriver jammed in the ring and an 18mm socket on a 22" bar. . . the crankshaft pulley bolt came off easily.

The pulley itself is not keen to drop off but that's the next job.

[georgen]

Glad you got the pin out without too much fuss.

[Rontok]

I hope you have the crank in the right place before taking the pulley off. I didn't like to say this while you were in a hole (well done for getting yourself out of it), but in the Laser Safety Precautions it says

Turn the engine in the normal direction

(clockwise unless stated otherwise)

The wording should be a bit stronger really.. clearly it should say "Do not turn the engine anti clockwise...".

[pbmitchell]

Thanks guys.

According to my reading of the Ford workshop manual, there's no mention of setting the crankshaft to 'TDC No.1 cyl' (or indeed any other position) until the crank pulley has been removed, the timing belt replaced, the crank pulley replaced and the bolt tightened.

At that stage, it says to set the crankshaft to TDC, the camshafts to TDC, and to tighten up the camshaft pulleys.

Believe me, I'm no expert at this job so any advice is very welcome indeed.

What do you think?

[Rontok]

Sorry, probably leading you astray there I'm about to tackle the cambelt on my Mk2 Golf so that procedure is at the forefront of my mind.

[pbmitchell]

A mystery has now arisen.

I tried rotating the crank to find TDC (with a long slim length of wood through No.1 spark plug hole) and, although the crank turns fine in an anti-clockwise direction, it will only turn a few degrees clockwise before coming to a dead stop and refusing to budge further.

I've rotated it 5 or 6 revolutions anticlockwise and it turns fine.

There are no locking pins in place and it turned just fine before I removed the crank pulley bolt.

If the timing has slipped, I should able to set it right when I adjust the camshafts, shouldn't I?

But why will it turn anti-clockwise ad infinitum, but locks up after a short rotation clockwise?

[wase16ll]

the story gets stranger....still cant get my head round bending the locking pin but hey ho..now sorted

only reason i can think of for crank not turning is its hitting a valve, but why it doesnt do this going other way is beyond me..

try turning the cams back a 1/4 turn then try turning crank...be very careful as its possible to bend a valve when turning by hand so dont force anything.

[pbmitchell]

Yes, I'll turn the cams when I get the cylinder head cover off.

I can't do this job in the sequence suggested by the Ford Workshop manual as the engine mounting bracket overlaps the cylinder head cover by a couple of millimeters, so I can't remove the cover before the bracket

For days now, I've been puzzling over how to access the bolts holding the power steering pulley. If I had arms like an octopus and hands like a newborn baby, I'd have done it it in five minute flat.

And I also have to get the crank pulley off now I've removed the bolt.

[wase16ll]

off top of my head...i would normally make undoing the crank bolt/removing the mount the first jobs..so

car on stands, support engine with a jack, ideally on timing belt end of engine. remove engine mount, this will allow you to raise and lower engine via jack to gain more access to pulleys and cover bolts..

can either give crank pulley gentle taps to break the seal, or lever it off with couple of screwdivers behind pulley..dont use chisel/screwdrivers/hammers on the belt ribs of pulley to drift it off, as they will get damaged easily.

when cam covers are off, should see a hex built into camshafts, use them to lock the cam when undoing/tightening cam pulleys, dont rely on the cam locking tool for this though should be ok to leave the tool in place..just let the spanner on the hax take the pressure

i thought the pas pulleys were pressed on not bolted, from memory you only needed to move the pump a little on models with air con...could be wrong though.

[wase16ll]

one other tip...set the crank at tdc, then turn approx 90deg, that way, pistons are halfway up their stroke and pose no danger whilst you set the cam timing and loosen the pulleys..once thats done, then set the crank at tdc and fit the belt

[pbmitchell]

i thought the pas pulleys were pressed on not bolted, from memory you only needed to move the pump a little on models with air con...could be wrong though.

Thanks for all advice.

Actually, I didn't mean the PAS pulley: I meant the pump. The stress of this job has affected my typing (and thinking)

The PAS pump bolts are difficult to see - I can see only two and there are supposed to be three - and they're difficult to get at too.

I shall persevere .

[pbmitchell]

For days and days I've been trying without success to find the three nuts to loosen the power steering pulley.

I've found two quite easily but the third is nowhere to seen, felt or in any other way detected.

Below is the diagram from the Ford workshop manual:

Firstly, perhaps a silly question, are we looking from on top or underneath?

I ask because it doesn't look very much like the real-life view from either direction.

I've searched with my eyes, and with my hands in places my eyes can't see.

But can I find that third bolt?

Can I (heck).

[wase16ll]

firstly, i take it your car has air conditioning and the PAS pump is roughly top and rear of engine as you look from front of car.

that being the case, you are looking at the picture as if you were sitting in the drivers seat, so to speak...so 2 of the bolts have to be removed from alternator belt side of engine, third bolt is screwed in from reverse side of those, ...imagine a wheel with 3 nuts...two of which facing outwards, 3rd is facing in and accessed from inside of wheel...think that makes sense

if PAS is under the car at the front, as viewed from front..then you dont have air con and dont need to touch PAS pump to do the belt

[pbmitchell]

Yes, it has air conditioning..

As I stand at the driver's wing looking down at the engine bay, the power steering pump is facing me (right above the aux belt tensioner pulley) and it has two bolts running (away from me) through a mounting plate. A nut screws onto each bolt on the opposite side of the mounting plate.

So far so good,

However, I'm totally mystified by your description of the other nut's location.

Please try again, cos I'll be over the moon if I can move this p/s pump.

Thanks.