Is it just me, or is my timing belt about to slip off?

[BartusCompater]

I'm getting to the point where it's just about time to throw everything back together. Having some trouble getting the new tensioner bearing/pulley on though.

I've noticed that the new part that I got from Auto Ricambi looks quite different from the old one. Here's a comparison picture:



Aside from the fact that the old bearing is missing the rubber and the balls, notice how the outer metal rim appears to be thicker on the old bearing, whereas the inner part is much thinner (same inner diameter).

Still, I'm not doubting that this is the correct size, I'm just having trouble sliding the new one on. I've thought about sanding the shaft down just a little bit, and I've tried lubricating it, but I'm opening my ears to other suggestions. Is sanding a bad idea?

[BartusCompater]

Just tapped the new tensioner pulley on with a block of wood. Wasn't smooth but it's on nice and even and it spins like it should.

[BartusCompater]

Got everything back together, fired it up and... number 2 injector was leaking at the hose?? Didn't touch the injectors so I'm really confused. Removing the hose now.

[RRoller123]

May have been all along and you are noticing it now?

[BartusCompater]

The symptoms I was having were reminiscent of low fuel pressure... but there wasn't any leak before. I sure hope that's all it was!

[BartusCompater]

So new hose went on, leak was fixed.

Hard to start and runs quite poorly, just as before. Guess it's good that I fixed the belt issue and replaced those seals. Still demoralized though.

[RRoller123]

Easy to do: check and see if the AFM flap is sticking. This is a frequent culprit, and was on mine.

[BartusCompater]

The flap is definitely squeaky and I can get it to hang up on itself from time to time. I'll mess around with tapping on it, etc. to see how that affects performance.

EDIT: Sanded down the area where the flap was catching up just a tiny bit. Much smoother now. Poor running issue wasn't resolved, however. I'm going to start a new thread for the poor running issues since I think what's going on no longer fits under the original topic of timing belt maintenance.

[RRoller123]

I had the same problem and did the sanding as well to improve things, but also did the "wiper mod" which is not that difficult. The wiper arm can be lowered on the shaft to get the contact point out onto new TF resistive material. I think a search will turn this up. Much easier to do than it looks, and it cured a number of ills in my 80 FI. I was amazed at the improvement. Here are a couple of photos: