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Thread: M30 Timing. Oh no, you didn't.

  1. #1
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    M30 Timing. Oh no, you didn't.

    I've been missing a bit of top end power and dealing with a 1222/Lambda control value. Car kinda fizzles at ~5000 rpm. Idles fine and has good mid-range, though.

    I thought it might be ignition related, especially since there was oil in the dizzy from a leaking cam seal. So I went to fix the leak...

    Pulled the upper timing chain cover and please tell me I'm wrong about this next part:

    O|T mark is lined up with the line on the engine. Sighting along the cam sprocket bolts, they don't appear to be either straight up and down, or in line with the TDC mark. A line through the left and right bolts wouldn't be parallel to a line between the timing chain cover bolt holes. A line through the top and bottom cam sprocket bolts doesn't point quite towards the TDC mark. I assume that's wrong. It'd need to turn at least one or two chain links to be in line with that horizontal or vertical line.

    The bentley doesn't really have a procedure for setting the cam timing all by itself. What's the best way to do it?

    Do I loosen the chain tensioner (cylinder that juts out of the engine towards the passenger side), pull the chain off, rotate the cam+sprocket a notch, and re-tighten the tensioner?

    Is it possible for the sprocket itself to be mounted on the cam wrong? It doesn't look like it, but I've never had one of these cylinder heads apart.

    Also the bentley says the sprocket bolts should be straight up and down. I assume that means straight up and down relative to the angle of the engine, not straight up and down towards the sky and ground.
    Last edited by paanta; 05-21-2009 at 10:24 PM. Reason: Automerged Doublepost

  2. #2
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    535i m30 turbo in boxes
    Straight up and down...not relative to the angle of the engine IIRC. GOt pics?
    HX55 535i
    My turbo is bigger than your turbo
    http://s255.photobucket.com/albums/h...espeedfactory/

  3. #3
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    No pics, but it's neither straight up and down with respect to the head/engine, nor with the ground. Can anyone confirm whether the cam sprocket bolts are supposed to line up with the engine vertical or actual vertical?

    What's the way to adjust it? Loosen the tensioner bolt, remove the four sprocket bolts, take the sprocket off the cam, take the chain off the sprocket and move it one tooth over, then reinstall?

  4. #4
    Join Date
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    535i -89 E34, 325ik -88 E30, 323i -85 E30
    See the link below for pictures when I did my M30B35 (sorry about the Swedish in the post) but I think you understand - the first two pictures are the important ones.
    http://www.pure-pf.com/phpBB2/viewto...=asc&highlight=

    1st : Make sure the vibrationdamper is at 0/T position
    2nd : Make sure the camshaft sprocket has it's dowel at 7 o'clock and the bolts shall be fully vertical / parallell to the engine head.

    Note! Make sure ALL the slack is on the tensioning side (same side as side chain tensioner) otherwise nothing will be correct.

    The rest of the pictures only shows that you can't possibly put back things in an incorrect way - it's "failsafe" :-)



    To readjust I think you are on the right way, loosen and remove the chain tensioner, undo the four bolts on the camshaft sprocket. Turn the camshaft so the four bolts are as in the pictures. Put the chain back on the camshaft sprocket and you cam immediately see if it is correct or not. Note! Always check you have ALL the slack on the tensioner side. Note! Keep the chain fairly stretched when you do this so it won't jump off the crankshaft sprockets.
    Tighten the camshaft sprockets slightly and turn over the engine (clockwise) one turn and stop at the 0/T mark and recheck everything looks good.
    "And it's half past four and I'm shifting gear..."
    "I'm rather a jack stand king than a trailer queen..."
    www.exx.se


  5. #5
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    535i m30 turbo in boxes
    What were your compression numbers? Mine were 90 ish then I adjusted the timing by 2 teeth and got about 145-150ish.
    HX55 535i
    My turbo is bigger than your turbo
    http://s255.photobucket.com/albums/h...espeedfactory/

  6. #6
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    I didn't check compression. Looks like mine was off by 1 tooth. Still haven't started the car. Interested to see how it runs...

  7. #7
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    Start it Start it Start it!!! I have the same issue...
    8 Bmws later I end up with a Lexus




  8. #8
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    Mr. Sharp, if you heard an M30 screaming down Miller/Maple at 6000 rpm, that was me.

    HOLY CRAP.

    When I bought the car it seemed slow compared to my e28 535i. Decent midrange punch, but _nothing_ over 5K rpm. 4 months of going over everything several times, hunting for the part causing low power and weird running. $1000 worth of tuneup parts down the hole...previous owner definitely screwed up the head install. Free 30% more power, easy.

    Funny how much power you miss when the cam is 10 degrees retarded.

    If I don't have the best running 535i on earth today, I'll eat my shirt. New plugs, wires, coil, air filter, fuel filter, fuel pump, FPR, CPS, AFM, dizzy + cap, idle control valve, o2 sensor, all new vacuum lines and intake seals, TPS and nicely adjusted valves. I've probably cleaned all the electrical contacts 3 times. And none of it was really necessary. Oh well.

    And my 3.64 LSD came today, too!
    Last edited by paanta; 05-22-2009 at 09:54 PM.

  9. #9
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    M20 - M30 - N62/S
    BMW HG R&R tech instructions..


  10. #10
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    I didn't see a clear writeup on this anywhere for the E34 535i and the Bentley assumes you're doing it as part of a head installation, so it's not real clear either. Here's what I did to check and adjust the cam timing.

    FWIW, it's not something you'd need to worry about except if someone had screwed up a head/timing chain install. I can't imagine the chain skipping a tooth under normal circumstances. Sure would have saved me an assload of money if I'd checked it in the first place, though.

    Again, my symptoms were as follows:
    1. CEL at idle/low RPM when the car was warm (code 1221 and 1222) along with some hesitation at the same time; and,
    2. Horrible top end power...it really felt like it needed to shift at about 4500-5000 rpm to get the most from the car. It felt like a pushrod V8.
    3. On the plus side, idle was VERY smooth and throttle response was better than it is now. Car sounded awesome, too. Really raw.

    All other possibilities (fuel, ignition, etc) had been exhausted. The previous owner had the head off about 5K miles ago, so I figured it was worth checking the timing. The fan shroud, fan, dizzy, rotor, rotor adapter, front half of the thermostat housing (in my case...you might be able to do it w/o doing this), valve cover & top timing cover all come off first. Be careful not to trash the portion of the headgasket between the timing covers, which you could do if parts were stuck together because someone had used gasket sealant in addition to the gaskets themselves. Take that timing cover off slowly.

    Set the crank at TDC by turning the crank clockwise until the T|0 mark lines up with the mark on the lower timing cover. If things are properly lined up, the bolts on the cam sprocket should be parallel to the cylinder head and vertical in alignment with the engine itself. They should NOT be in alignment with the ground, since the engine is set at an angle. You should also see the dowel in the lower left of the sprocket (looking at it from the front), cyl #1's cam lobes should point away from the rocker arms and #6's should point up (valves on overlap)...

    I could see it was off by one tooth on my car, so what I did was:

    1. Clean off the chain and gear with carb cleaner a little bit.
    2. Using a sharpie, put a mark on a chain link and on the sprocket tooth adjacent to it (where the chain would need to be). Do it in a couple places in different colors in case you rub one of the marks off accidentally.
    3. Undo the 19mm tensioner bolt and slowly remove it, the spring and the piston (RealOEM showed a ball bearing in there, but mine didn't have one) being careful not to let the spring shoot across the garage. Oil will leak out a bit, so throw a rag under it.
    4. Undo the four 10mm bolts on the sprocket and slip it off the cam. Be careful not to drop one down into the lower timing chain cover. Best way to cover the gap was to just jam a big rag in there for a minute. Fishing stuff out of that hole is a PITA, though with a big rare earth magnet you can sort of scoot lost hardware along the inside of the oil pan to the oil level sender hole.
    5. Take the chain off the sprocket and move it over so the two black marks line up, being careful not to let it go totally slack or drop it. You don't want it to falling off the crank sprocket down below, since removing the lower timing cover to fix that is a bunch more work.
    6. Using a big pair of pliers, grab the cam flange and turn it about 10 degrees in the correct direction until #1's lobes point down, #6's point up, and the holes in the flange are parallel/perpendicular to the head. IE, how it should have been oriented in the first place.
    7. Put the sprocket back on, and get at least one of the four 10mm bolts on right away to keep it there. The others probably won't line up initially. At this point I had to use the pliers to adjust the cam slightly so the sprocket and flange lined up perfectly.
    8. Put in the other three bolts, torque to 10nm, replace the tensioner and torque to 40nm.
    9. Rotate the crank around a couple times so make sure the T|0 marks and sprocket bolts both indicate TDC at the same time once the chain is tight.
    10. New gaskets on both sides + new cam nose seal.
    11. Reinstall all the parts. Refill+bleed the cooling system if necessary. Only the dizzy rotor adapter needed locking compound, IIRC.

    Overall, it took probably 3-4 hours with beer in the middle (can I say that on this board?) AND a valve job, spark plug replacement, scraping off old permatex gasket, etc. It's one of those things that could snowball if something stripped or dropped, though. Be sure to torque no more than the spec.

    Notes: While turning the crank after the reinstallation of the tensioner piston/spring, the tensioner would move back and forth any time I let pressure off the crank pulley, so there was slack in the chain. I was a little concerned about this, but it isn't making noises when the car is running, so I assume it's fine.
    Last edited by paanta; 05-23-2009 at 12:04 PM.

  11. #11
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    Does it really matter if the chain moves on the crank? Cuz the crank itself aint moving, and the cam isn't moving. As long as the cam and crank are in sync does it matter where the chain is?
    Last edited by shogun; 06-16-2021 at 05:21 PM.

  12. #12
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    Quote Originally Posted by bimmer@15 View Post
    Does it really matter if the chain moves on the crank? Cuz the crank itself aint moving, and the cam isn't moving. As long as the cam and crank are in sync does it matter where the chain is?
    It does matter where the chain is. Because the engine rotates clockwise, the chain needs to be tight on the right side of the engine and loose on the left side.
    demet

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