cam gear + left index finger fail...
 

So like the title says i was cleaning some oil off the front of the engine compartment and under side of the hood, when the rag i was using got caught on the timing belt and pulled my hand through the cam gear belt area:eek2:, yes i know very poor judgment wiping it while the engine was running:egads:, but none the less its done and now im facing the consequences, so now im left with an index finger that's twice the size of my thumb and a cam gear that jumped a few degrees due to my finger separating the gear from the belt, now my car wont start because cam timing is all off, i had an appointment with TPS on monday to put on new cam gears, timing belt , water pump, crank damper and other odds and ends, but now i have no way to get it there besides a tow, am i basically stuck or is there anyway i can adjust the gear without completely taking the belt off? keep in mind im one handed at the moment, ill post some pics of my finger and the cam gear in the morning for reference, but any advice is greatly appreciated...

first off, post pics of the finger.

Second, you'd have to take off the belt, or at least loosen the timing belt tensioner, make sure the crank and cams are at tdc, then put the belt back on and you should be golden.

Be more careful next time.

Yea man glad its still connected. :thumbup:

thanx, yeah im glad i still have 10 fingers, all though im reduced to using only 1 when i type now versus normaly using 2 :p, but by request here yah go, in the 2nd pic that's all the holes i burnt in the nail to help bleed out some pressure, and yes thats puss/blood, and it hurts alot more than it looks,:cry:

Wow man, that definitely is no fun. I'm glad my friend didn't get caught in mine yesterday, he came really close too while checking an oil leak. Muscle car guys... so not used to open cam gears...

I had a transmission fall on my finger. My nail still hasnt grown back properly. Stay strong brother!

First off. DOH! on your part. Sucks that it happened but we learn from mistakes.
2) Just tow it down to TPS. They'll put everything back and adjust everything for you.
3) Good job on releasing the pressure under that nail. You'll still probably lose that nail but it will grow back. I slammed my finger in a car door and the door was completely shut. Wasn't pretty.

But is TPS doing work on a GE motor or a GTE?

yeah my nail looks like its about to fall off:egads: thats all i need now is a finger that looks like the FLY, but im gonna try and get to the belt tensioner to get the timing belt off the cam gears, but thanx for the comments, and if the nail falls off best believe im gonna post some pics:D

ouch that reminds me the time when I did something stupid by turning the wheels with my finger still inside and having it squished against the calipers

there gonna be working on a ge motor, mary over there quoted me 415$ for labor if i bring my own parts, i thought that was an awesome deal, being that i broke a breaker on the crank pulley doing the starter trick... but whats gettin done is cam seals, fms, ati crank damper, fidanza cam gears, gmb water pump,and gates kevlar timing belt, but i might have to tow like you said because just walking down stairs to my car my finger felt like it was gonna explode, so dont think ill be attempting anything at the moment..

just a little update for someone that might have the same problem as me,.. well i cut a strip of vinyl flooring and wedged it between the cam gear and timing belt and proceeded to turn the crank until the vinyl strip was in between the gear and the belt, once it was in there it made it pretty easy to turn the cam gear without disrupting the belt or anything else for that matter, so i aligned the gear to tdc and turned the crank again until the piece of vinyl flooring fell out the other end, started up first try, so no tow for me:D saved myself about 125$... i can post pics of the procedure if anyone is interested,...

um, dude be careful! your lucky it wasn't worst. that could have been ALL BAD...

man glad to hear your finger wasn't worse, I made a mistake and thought i about lost a finger doing something similar on my girlfriends car while messing with it a few weeks ago lol..

btw pretty clever with the fix getting it started again..

Good thing it wasn't your tie.:egads:

I agree, that was the best outcome for that screwed up situation,.. the hot doctor in the emergency room said if i chipped or cracked the bone i could have got gangrene or bone infection and they would've had to amputate,.. so although it was painful i wouldn't have it any other way:woot: