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Cam ate my distributor

R

roosteroby

NAXJA Forum User
Location
New Jersey
I pulled the distributor after jeep stalled out and spit up some oil. Replaced the CPS and jeep would still not run. Checked for spark and then checked the relationship of the rotor and TDC for cylinder #1. Took out the distributor to index it properly as per the FSM and found the gear on the distributor was severely chewed probably causing it to jump out of time. My question is do I replace the distributor or the distributor and cam. Is the distributor gear made of a weaker material than the cam to protect against motor damage or do I have big problems?:doh:
 
Who is this Cam Fella? I better watch my distributor closely! :D Hows the oil pressure?
 
I know alot of aftermarket distributors have bronze gears, the distributor gear will get damaged instead of the cam..
I hope thats the case with yours. Otherwise it will be a new cam, distributor, and lifters..
AFAIK youre not supposed to replace the cam without replacing the lifters. Or at least, its suggested that you do...
 
Parts list to fix: oil pan gasket, rear main while you're there, oil pump, front cover and water pump gaskets, timing chain and sprockets if needed. Head gasket, valve cover gasket, cam and lifters, distributor gear. In other words if the motor's getting long in the tooth might think about rebuilding it since it'll be 2/3 apart anyway.
 
I replaced the oil pan gasket, the oil pump, the rear main seal a week ago, then this happened. I replaced the valve cover gasket as well as the leaky oil filter o ring at the block. The oil pump is not seized I hear the gurgling when I turn it with a screwdriver. The distributor was reinstalled to see if it would run, and it just jumped back to where I found it 180 degrees from #1 on the cap so I guess between #2 and #4. I think there is some wear on the cam but if I'm going to replace that I figure I may go with a bigger cam does that make sense? I have the magna flow high flo cat, and dynomax cat back with a cold air intake. Would I need a chip to adjust the motor to accept the new cam?
 
I would still pull the oil pump and disassemble it and look for galling and wear. Distributor's put virtually zero load on the bearing themselves. All the load derives from the load of the oil pump. I would also pull a rod cap and main bearing cap to look for degradation and foreign metal.

Don't forget to drain the oil and inspect if for metal. That metal had to go somewhere and running it through your bearings is the last place you want it to go.
 
I would be really upset if the week old oil pump caused all this. Got the pump from autozone looked at the part before I in stalled it the oil pressure was up over 80 on my dash gauge assuming that its accurate. Another question the pump didn't come with a gasket so I used RTV Black to seal it to the block is that ok?
 
80psi puts a hell of a strain on that little gear. I would definately pull everything apart and do some serious inspection. I would even cut open the oil filter.
 
Your oil pressure sender could be disconnected or not functioning right. That commonly causes the oil pressure gauge to spike high.
 
Oil Pressure Relief Valve jammed causing overload of the driveing gear system??? (Goes above 80 psi with RPM and tight engine? -gauge tops at 80) (Just maybe's/guess's)
 
Id replace the gears and drop it back in and move on. It's common for the gears to get worn out to have excessive slops and sometime completely worn enough to skips gears. its made to do that so you wont need to replace camshaft just because of the gears got worn. I just had to replace mine in my BlaZeR-2
 
also if this turn out still not work (camshaft gears actually's shot) still a worth shot to try without tearing everything apart and find there's nothing wrong.
 
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