Evening all,

I urgently need some wisdom.

I tried to do my own adjuster replacements on my car and after timing it back up with proper tools I started the car for 5 seconds and it sounded sort of ok it sounded like most the cylinders were firing up, the car was shaking a little but nothin major and then I turned it off.

I plugged in my icarsoft scanner and it came up with random cylinder misfire error but nothing about any particular cylinders.

I start the car again and it just sounded horrible like no cylinders were firing up which I just don’t get because the first start up it did actually fire up…

I opened the car back up put the crank back to TDC and rotated the crank pulley just 360 degrees and flipped the camshafts back to being smiley face up because I made a hash of timing the first time and ended up rotating the camshafts when I shouldn’t have done. So doing this was just for my peace of mind that maybe I had timed the camshafts with the crank pulley on the power stroke instead of the intake stroke….

so I time it all back up perfectly again using the tools, I clear codes and go to start the car back up and again it sounded like it made that nice v8 cold start so clearly cylinders fired up nicely but the car was shaking so I plugged the scanner back in and it was the same error “ random cylinder misfire”.

i turn the car on again and the same weird issue before I retimed it, the car didn’t even make any attempt to start firing any cylinders it just shook the car and sounded horrible so of course I shut the car off.

You might be thinking why wouldn’t I check the camshaft adjusters as I opened all 4 up but the scanner didn’t give me any sensor errors or anything that would point to it being the camshaft adjusters so I didn’t bother.

Does anyone have any idea what could be wrong or point me in the direction of a m156 engine wizard on this forum?

The questions I need answering are what are your thoughts on what has gone wrong?

Is it possible to time a m156 engine on the power stroke instead of the intake stroke or is it just impossible with the way the ECU is, so did I affectively waste my time retiming it on the “other TDC phase by rotating the crank pulley 360 and flipping the camshafts”.

Can a faulty or badly put together camshaft adjuster if it is the culprit actually allow the car to start sort of ok the first time and then when you go to start it a second time it just sounds like death.

sorry for the essay but please I really need help 🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼

 

You specifically say you set the crank back to TDC in your 5th paragraph, what do you mean by that, dod you set the crank pulley to the zero mark? It should be timed with the crank pulley set to the 40 degrees mark.

 

who’s parts did you use? Reach out to the company

 

Sound sour of timing. You may have the camshafts flipped? Like you disconnected them from the chain rotated the engine and then rebuttoned everything up? Just reset the timing. Not at dtc at 40 degrees as mentioned above (although I'm guess that's what you meant) get the camshafts back into timing and then try starting it

 

I always set it to 40 on the crank for timing just to be clear.

 

I thought maybe because the crank pulley rotates twice to the camshaft rotating once I thought maybe I could have timed the engine on the wrong cycle but someone else laughed when I said this and said you can’t do that as long as it’s at 40 and you can get the timing tools in the back.

my thought process was you set the crank to 40 , and the camshafts locked with the timing tools so you know it’s the correct orientation and then remove the locking tools and rotate the crank 360 degrees now the camshafts are upside down, loosen the phaser bolts and flip the camshafts and lock them with timing tools, I did this and thought maybe I had ****ed the timing but like I said a mechanic laughed at me and said that’s not possible.

Im going to attack the camshaft adjusters , they can be the only thing causing this surely

 

I used 63 motorsports, surely they are reputable

 

reputable enough. It should all be at 40 degrees and all timing tools in place and locked on both banks preferably. If it started fine in the beginning and changed characteristics after it is because it needs a relearn. The computer will apply previously learned timing characteristics of the old worn phasers and compensate for it with new ones that dont need compensation. If you don’t have the ability to do the relearn try to disconnect the battery overnight to clear the computer’s memory

 

It’s best to have two tools. The back tool is the most important. Cams spin at the same time if the back bar fits on one side technically should fit on the opposite side as well.

refer to this video

 

if you have the camshafts 180 degree's out, there is a possibility you bent your valves which would cause misfires.

if all is timed correctly now, best that you complete a compression check and leak down of all cylinders.

 

I manually rotated the crank pulley about 10 times before firing it up so I don’t think I did.

well it turned out one of the issues was that the new plate I put on the exhaust camshaft adjuster on bank 1 was not allowing the rotor to move, I put the old plate on and it moved perfectly.

this is tonight by the way since I posted the first message.

anyway so I timed it all up and buttoned it back together and now instead of just random cylinder misfire I was getting random cylinder misfire and misfire on cylinders 2,5,3,6 and 1. I removed spark plugs from cylinder 1 and it looked black and carbon tastic all over the spark part (tip) and it had oil on the screw part which clearly can’t be good 😂.

so I just ordered new spark plugs I’ll get them fitted and give it one more go, anything else I’ve lost my patience now i have opened and closed this car up about 8 times and it refuses to start.

it worked perfectly before I touched it, lesson learnt don’t do work on cars unless you’re a pro 😅😂

 

Oil couldve travelled into the spark plugs during the removal of the covers. Easily can happen to anyone. It definitely is rewarding to DIY but with so much that could go wrong leave it to the pro’s