Car: 91 Civic DX
Motor: 91 D16A6 (total swap including wire harness front to back to Si)
Problem: Timing all the way Advanced, still a couple of degrees retarded from Proper marks!

I have been trying to pass Cali smg with my CND 91 Civic, and down to my last two issues, looking for help on one of them.

The motor is rebuilt top to bottom to stock specs, including the cam. Went to smog, they told me my timing was at 7 Degrees. This suprised me as the car seemed to run very well. Got a timing gun (non adjustable) to line up my timing marks. Trying to line up to the middle of the three marks on the crank.

My distributor is fully advanced (toward fire wall) and I am still just on the outside of the first mark, timing is retarded by a couple of degrees.

I have searched and cant find any solutions to this yet. I do not think it has jumped a tooth, or the car would be running much worse (wouldn't it?), it runs well enough that you would never know its off. If the cam wasn't set properly I would be having running problems as well. I could dremel out the bracket to allow me to advance the timing a little more and have it clear, but this seems to be a band aid to another problem that I would like to get sorted.

Any thoughts on this would be helpful.

On a side note, when the motor was rebuilt I had the cam I am using refinished. The guy who did the cams (Colt Cams out of Vancouver BC) told me that some of these motors used a different cam. If you don't have the right one, you will never be able to set the timing properly is what I was told. I have never heard nor read this anywhere. Has anyone else ever heard of this?

Any help here would be great. I am having another person look at it who knows more about this stuff than me this week, but would like to do it myself if possible. Any insights are good!

 

your timing belt must be off take it apart and do timing again, as long as the cam came from the motor that you put it in there should be no problem. have you have the head or deck milled?

-joseph

 

Did you jump the service connector while changing the ignition timing? If you did and its still not right then its probably the cam timing,.

 

Cam isnt from the same motor, that was one of the issues but as I said above, in my mind it shouldnt matter. A D16A6 cam should be the same as another D16A6 cam.

I did jump it. I usually dont, as I've never seen it make a diffrence, but I did it last night just to see if it did, still the same problem.

Has anyone else used a cam from a diffrent D16A6 is theres and found a timing issue?

Any help or thoughts on the issue is apreciated!

EDIT: If the belt has jumped a tooth, wouldnt the timing be WAY more off, with car running terrible?

 

sounds like camshaft timing is off - Si timing is not same as D15

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by lightcrx &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">your timing belt must be off take it apart and do timing again, as long as the cam came from the motor that you put it in there should be no problem. have you have the head or deck milled?

-joseph</TD></TR></TABLE>

i belive si cams are the same

-joseph

 

Sounds like your a tooth off on the belt. Mine is a tooth off and I have to have the dizzy turned all the way toward the front of the car. Runs pretty good, so yes it could run ok with a tooth off and dizzy adjusted right.

 

Exactly what I ran into. Three things.

Make sure your rotor is mounted correct.
When I was timing mine it was doing the same I moved the belt a tooth, but could not get it to 18 deg. But I could get it to either 16 or 20 enough to pass.
Then I got an adjustable cam gear put it on lined up the marks and I got to 18 Plus I could adj to 16 and 20. So the new cam gear and the tooth on the belt/gear was my problem.

 

Sounds like everyone thinks its the belt, so thats the first thing I'll check when I get back at it this week. Thanks for the thoughts guys, and Ill let you know what happens!