How to install an adjustable 1JZ cam gear in 1.5 hours

[Mr DOHC]

I did this this morning. I bought a Fidanza cam gear from Rocket








here is the before pic






Firstly take out the top 2 bolts that hold in the top timing gear cover, 1 left and 1 right.
put a 17mm spanner on the cam bolt and hit it to loosen the cam bolt.

next, turn the motor over till both cam gear marks meet up with the marks on the backing plate.








and the mark on the balancer meets up with the 0





for this next bit u will need a 1/4 drive ratchet and at lest a 200mm extension with a 12mm socket, see next to my ratchet, the little 3/4 inch cylinder thing, thats the cam belt tensioner, there is 1 bolt either side of it,









Loosen 1 at a time as it is under huge pressure and it may go crooked if u loosen 1 side too much, BUT DONT REMOVE IT. loosen them equally till 1 bolt falls out, when it does that means it it at maximum looseness, now put that bolt back in to hold the tensioner there.
Take the cam bolt all the way out, and remove the gear.
Now put the new gear on the cam and throw the bolt in finger tight. make sure the marking all line up still. working from the intake side first, make sure the belt is very tight, slip it over the intake cam. Once u have it over the intake cam only, grab the 17mm spanner and give it a slight turn anticlockwise, it will pull full tension on the belt. Then do the exhaust cam. do the same with the spanner again
When putting it over the exh cam it will be difficult still, but perservere. make sure all the marks still line up.

Get back under the car and do up the tensioner bolts in the reverse order of removal, bit by bit.

To setup the gear the same way i did {6 deg retard on the exh wheel} loosen the bolts on the wheel and grab the 17mm spanner again and spin the cam ANTI CLOCKWISE {as if u are looking at it from the front of the motor}. If u havent done it right it will be fairly responsive but have no balls up top.

Tighten up the bolts to spec

bling bling bitch, now to run 107mph


Thanks to Derek, chris davey and braden for your help

[Draven]

nb: if it's coming up time to do your timing belt (anywhere near 100K kms) this is a good time to do it, and change the hydraulic tensioner if you're paranoid like me (it's not a hugely expensive part)

[Mr DOHC]

true.

thi is a way to encourage ppl to do it. cause the reason i never did it cause i thought it was a 6 hour operation, belts off, fan out etc, but its not

[chris davey]

good writeup phil. will get off my ass and install mine now

[jak]

As i said before, nice writeup!

Alot of 1j people seem to be opting for adj cam gears these days.

Jak

[Mr DOHC]

its definately worth the value, i can stand on it at 40k or less and it'll kick down to 1st and fishtail 1st gear

[Enigma-Penguin]

Nice guide man +ve I might just jump the gun and throw mine on though it'll have to come off and back on again when I throw in the hks bump sticks.

[Mr DOHC]

Can this also me copied into the "articles" section

[ReQuieM]

The alternator didn't get in the way? What is the 1J originaly out of? I wasn't sure it was possible to get to the bolts past the alternator on my JZA70 but if your is the same its nice to know that its possible!

BTW it's also good idea to change the cam seals.... I didn't tho! lol

[Mr DOHC]

no, alternator was fine, SFA room tho, was from a JZX81

[Ribfeast]

Alternator is very easy to remove anyway. 2 bolts, 1 main power cable, and a plug from the back of it. Good writeup mate

[Slim]

I thought i'd add my recent experiences to this thread to help out people that may be buying themself a cam gear in the future.

My shiny new GReddy cam gear...


With much nervousness i started pulling things apart as per Mr DOHC's instructions.

The first thing i tackled was removing the timing belt tensioner and carefully loosened the two bolts evenly. I unfortunately loosened them toooo evenly because when one of the bolts fell out the other one did as i was attempting to put the first one back in.

That caused big problems because no-one told me how to put the tensioner back in after it has been fully taken out.


So for all the other newbies that don't know... here's how to do it (a mate told me the following trick).

First... when you remove the timing belt tensioner you will notice that the little rod poking out the end has a hole in it. You will need to find yourself a 1.5mm allan key, or equivalent, to poke into that hole.


The next step is to put the tensioner in a vice, or some other kind of press. Make sure you have a piece of aluminium, soft metal or sheet of nylon to protect the little rod's nose when you squash it in the vice. I can only assume that you probably don't want to wreck the nice smooth machined finish.

The timing belt tensioner is hydraulically damped so do NOT compress it too fast or you can damage it. You will notice that if you try to squeeze it too fast it will be really difficult... don't force it, do it slowly.

When the hole in the rod lines up with the hole in the side of the tensioner you should be able to see light through the slot in the rubber neck. When you can see it lining up, poke the allan key in the hole and then release the pressure from the vice. This should have your timing belt tensioner locked down and allow you to put it back in the car with ease.

(note: in this picture the allan key is poked in too far... i pulled it out so the end was flush with the rubber before i tried to reinstall it. )

When you go to put the tensioner back in the car... just get the two bolts started, then pull out the allan key. Initially i tried to pull it out after i had fully done up the bolts and i think that made it much more difficult.


So, after i had put my new cam gear in place and had double checked that the timing marks lined up, i tried to start the car. It made a horrible noise that i can't really describe... but i know what was happening. The timing belt was jumping teeth. I only turned the key for less than a second and didn't try again. When i had a look at the marks on the gears i noticed that the crank had moved, the inlet gear had move but my new exhaust gear had not!

When i took the GReddy gear off i had a look at the back of it and discovered this...


My shiny new cam gear was fouling the bolt that holds the timing belt cover backing plate to the engine. Basically it's the bolt that sits directly behind the gear. I was pretty pissed off because i thought this gear was supposed to be for a 1J and a 2J. It said so on the box.

Has anyone else heard of this problem? My remedy was simply to remove the offending bolt out and hope that the other 3 should hold the backing plate in place. I don't know what people do when they have custom inlet gears too because that would leave that backing plate with only two bolts at the bottom holding it away from the cam gears.

Anyhow... it was a bit of an ordeal but wouldn't have been so bad if i'd know the tensioner trick and if my stupid cam gear did what it was supposed to.

This thread helped a lot though... it at least gave me the confidence to do it by myself. I wouldn't have known where to start otherwise.

[silver_ta22]

The alternator didn't get in the way? What is the 1J originaly out of? I wasn't sure it was possible to get to the bolts past the alternator on my JZA70 but if your is the same its nice to know that its possible!

BTW it's also good idea to change the cam seals.... I didn't tho! lol

i couldn't do it, i just took out one bolt from the alternator and swung it out of the way, easy access then, only adds a couple minutes.

[Norbie]

Has anyone else heard of this problem?

I have the same cam gears on my 2JZ and I didn't have that problem. The backing plate is held in place by all the bolts.

Maybe a previous owner of your engine had the backing plate off at some point and used non-original bolts to put it back on?

[Soarer21]

I have the same cam gears on my 2JZ and I didn't have that problem. The backing plate is held in place by all the bolts.

Maybe a previous owner of your engine had the backing plate off at some point and used non-original bolts to put it back on?

Indeed that is quite probable. The original bolts for the cover have a very thin head on them compared to regular 6mm bolts. If some goose stuck a non-original bolt in there you may find you've got the troubles you experienced