Hello everyone.

I am in the process of doing a coolant leak repair (involving the removal of the intake) and at the same time i decided to do my timing belt.





I am waiting for the parts to arrive from sewell lexus, but for the time being I am trying to get all my timing marks lined up and ready to go for the new belt.

So here is the issue:

I have ambiguous timing marks! There are two marks on both of the cams.




Before I removed the timing belt, I lined up the Crank shaft to TDC as in this picture:






but when I did this, the two cams were NOT lined up with anything. NEITHER the white paint marks NOR the physical indentations on the cams were in line with the marks on the brackets of the engine. ( do not have a picture of this, but the two white marks on the cams were both pointing straight down in 6:00 position)

My suspicion is that maybe the timing belt had jumped a few teeth. As far as i know, the car ran okay before I got involved in this project, but I wouldn't know for sure because this is a brand new to me car.

I just bought the car a few weeks ago and test drive was smooth as silk!

It ran very good! (pick up the car for $1000 because of the rear bypass pipe coolant leak)



So what I did after I removed the belt was to align the PHYSICAL makings on the two cams with the marks on the engine bracket:

LEFT CAM (driver side):



RIGHT CAM (passenger side):



My question to everyone is: Is this correct?

I am confused because before I even touched the belt, the cam markings did NOT line up with anything. I am 100% sure that i aligned the crank to TDC, you can even see it in the photographs. Before I removed the lower timing belt cover, the mark on the crank pulley was in line with the "0" position.

Why were the CAM gears not in time? Did they jump time?

Did I properly align all the gear and am i ready to slap the timing belt on when it arrives?

Thank you!

 

it appears from your photos the car was potentially not in time

the paint marks are not factory, someone drew those on, ignore them

it looks like you have it correct now, however, your photos are not completely clear, so I suggest you go back to the factory service manual timing alignment procedure and follow it to the letter, after positioning the #1 cylinder at top dead center and verifying the crank mark at 0 degrees is correct

PM me if you don't have access to the factory service manual

 

BEFORE you removed the belt, you should have made another revolution of the crankshaft and it would have probably all lined up for you.. the plug doesn't fire every time, in between is an exhaust stroke... but you knew that...do what cowboy said and get it right, but don't worry, if that is a photo of your car, it has a non interference engine and you should do no damage.

 

Thank you, this pretty much answers my question. Embarrassingly, I forgot about the whole exhaust stroke thing. That's a big thing to overlook but its been a while since Ive done a timing belt.



Now my question is how do I know if cylinder one is on the intake stroke? Since my intake manifold is off and i can see the valves, can I just look in and see the intake valve start to open?



Do both valves open simultaneously on intake stroke?
(there are two valves in there but you can only see one in the picture)

Then once I get cylinder one ready, how do I know how to set up the other cam?




I should have marked the original belt before I took the belt off and started moving cams.

 

at this point just line the marks up, on the 1st gen cars it doesn't matter as there's no danger of the pistons eating the valves.

 

That's what I'm thinking too. I just wouldn't want to put it back together wrong and have it run like crap. Because then I would have to take all this stuff apart again to adjust the timing.

If anyone else has advice, I'll take it.

 

assuming you took the belt off on the exhaust stroke, since nothing lined up, make one revolution with the crank, then line up the cams and put it together..

 

If the factory timing marks on the cams are lined up with the factory marks on the shielding, then you are good. Although, the paint marks on the cams will probably eventually line up but were likely done when the car was not at TDC and the previous grease-monkey just marked it where it was and did a fast slappy-slappy belt change.

I'm guessing the car ran fine before you started in on it, since you said you decided to do the timing belt rather than needed to, so I wouldn't be to worried about the other marks.

 

I have a '99, and the paint marks were put on at the factory. When I replaced my WP, TB and tensioner I also noticed the paint marks, and wondered why they were there. As I recall, they corresponded with very faint markings on the old belt, but the belt also had a distinctive timing mark, which was properly set. Best I can figure, the paint marks have something to do with checking the variable cam settings while assembling the engine.