Thread: The joy or not of travel

Originally Posted by jx2mad

Sad news. The engine dropped the inlet valve on no 1 cylinder. Shattered to bits and apparently sucked around motor. Block destroyed. Looks like I have to find a replacement engine.

Wouldn't have anything to do with the recent replacement of the timing belt, would it.

The reason I ask is that some years ago, I had a Toyota HiAce with the 2.8L diesel when I was running a pilot vehicle. I had the timing belt replaced on this and a couple of weeks later as I was overtaking a truck in the hills just outside Perth, the engine suddenly lost all power and I ended up on the side of the road.

The problem was that they had taken the drive pulley off the end of the camshaft to replace the timing belt (buggered if I know why - I have done the job a number of times since and there is no need to touch this pulley at all) and had not re-fitted it correctly. As I was overtaking the truck, the drive pulley moved on the end of the cam and sheared the locating pin, allowing it to spin freely (the retaining bolt had not been properly tightened and loc-tite used). This resulted in a number of the valves doing a tap dance on top of the pistons.

I was very lucky in that no pistons were damaged, and I managed to source another complete head which I fitted myself. That engine went on to eventually clock over a million km.

I picked up my van this afternoon. Replacement motor sounds and runs nice. I hope this is the end of my saga. 7 weeks off the road but I had a spare car available so not a problem. Looks like the repairer has done a good job