More 968 Cam Maintenance
Another 968 came through today. 158k miles on the clock, with an unknown history of cam maintenance.
Pulled the valve cover to see what we were dealing with. The top pad, while worn, was not in horrible shape. Typically I see more wear on the bottom pad, but you can’t inspect it without pulling the cams and tensioner.
Cams out of the car……To pull the cams, you need to remove the timing belt. On the 968, that more or less means you will be pulling the front end down, so doing the cam maintenance and the timing belt job at the same time would save a lot of labor. We had just done the timing belt service within the last year or so, so we knew that didn’t need any replacements.
New pads in place, new chain, and the assembly back togther. It is hard to see by the picture, but the bottom tensioner pad was pitting excessively, so it definitely needed to be replaced. Notice the old brown colored pads, and the new pads which are tan. The trick to getting the tensioner in and out of the chain assembly, is to remove the top allen posts holding the top pad in place. Then barely slide the cam pad off so you can get on the metal tensioner plates on the back side. Compress with a c clamp, and slide it out. Do the same going back in, installing the allen posts last.
And cams back in place. Make sure to use a lot of assembly lube on the journals and bridges when putting it all back together. Then you can button up the timing belt, and head down the road! Before we could do that, we also did a round of front wheel bearings, and a quick radio rewiring. Successful Saturday.
