Help! First breakdown in 15 years

[Laird Scooby]

Originally Posted by chris s

My own fault as I fitted a new timing belt last February. At that time I did reuse the old pulley securing bolt, but I did loctite the threads and torqued it to specs, but somehow it loosened.
Chris

Did you clean the threads completely of the bolt and also the one in the crank nose Chris?

If not, even with new Threadlock, you could easily get an incorrect torque response from your torque wrench and easily think you've torqued it correctly when you haven't.

[chris s]

I finally got around to stripping it down today, and all pulleys are tight and in situ.
(The RAC man who brought me home half removed the timing cover and reckoned that the lower pulley had shifted. It hasn't). The belt tensioner however was spinning but was seized against the block. I reckoned I must have overtightened it with the 40 year old torque wrench my Dad let me borrow. Then I suppose as the belt stretched it began to lose tension.
A cambelt and tensioner will be with me tomorrow (and I've ordered a new torque wrench as well!).
Cheers,
Chris

[Bugjam1999]

Glad you’ve found the fault- hard to tell if you’re aware from the way you’ve described it but the tensioner doesn’t adjust automatically, it only takes up tension when the securing nut holding it is released. The nut should be released periodically to allow the spring to take up any slack, then the nut done up again. There’s a rubber bung in the cam front cover to access the nut for this purpose.

Obviously not whilst the engine is running!

There are prescribed intervals for this release and retighten after a new belt is fitted as a new belt will stretch a bit, someone will know them- but if you haven’t done this since you fitted your new cambelt I’d guess this will be the source of your trouble.

Cheers

Oh and I know the dangers of old torque wrenches- I snapped a head bolt off in the block once as the torque wrench was reading far lower than its actual torque...

[Clifford Pope]

I'm confused.
You said you found that the bolt holding the lower pulley had come loose so the pulley had loosened and the belt had come off?
Now you say the AA man also said that, but you say it hadn't.
Now you say the bolt holding the adjuster pulley had been overtightened. I don't understand that - you say it was spinning but seized against the block.

Tightening that bolt doesn't tighten the pulley against the block, it merely needlessly holds it more firmly in its current position. I don't understand these contradictions.
If you had overtightened the adjuster pulley bolt then nothing would have happened unless you had broken it - but you would have known that?

I think we need clarification on exactly what has come loose through undertightening, what has broken through overtightening, and what is seized.

[Laird Scooby]

Originally Posted by chris s

I finally got around to stripping it down today, and all pulleys are tight and in situ.
(The RAC man who brought me home half removed the timing cover and reckoned that the lower pulley had shifted. It hasn't). The belt tensioner however was spinning but was seized against the block. I reckoned I must have overtightened it with the 40 year old torque wrench my Dad let me borrow. Then I suppose as the belt stretched it began to lose tension.
A cambelt and tensioner will be with me tomorrow (and I've ordered a new torque wrench as well!).
Cheers,
Chris

If you didn't re-tension the timing belt after 600 miles, for most of its service life it will have been loose causing varying strange things like sudden periods of low performance, particularly when called on to work harder.

That will almost certainly be why it's got more and more loose until the teeth were eventually stripped.
How long has the belt been on there? (Mileage and years)

[chris s]

Sorry for the confusion, Clifford Pope. I'll try to make this clearer.
When the car broke down and wouldn't start the RAC man partly opened the timing cover, found the slack belt and said "there's your problem, the lower pulley has come off". I took a glance and took his word for it, as although I've done all the servicing and MOT work on the car in the last 15 years (except for a clutch change), I'm obviously not going to have the knowledge of a professional who had mentioned he'd been working on 240s since the 80s.
As I mentioned the pulleys were all tight when I stripped it and looking for a reason for the belt coming off when I found the tensioner bolt was very tight I (wrongly) assumed I'd overtightened it, assuming that it would tension itself, not realising that I was meant to retension the belt after a certain mileage. So I'm obviously far from being an expert unlike most users on here but I'm keen to learn, and through this group you're never short of helpful owners willing to give advice, that's the beauty of this forum.
Thanks,
Chris

[chris s]

Laird and Bugjam , thanks for your helpful replies.

You can probably tell from my previous post that I didn't retension the belt after I fitted a new one last time. I don't think that will be something I'll ever forget to do again!
Cheers,
Chris

[mrredwards]

Hi I have a 240 Torslanda with a B200f engine.I had a cambelt go and it destroyed all 8 valves.I had to buy a good second hand one on Ebay luckily it came with all the valves.Just swapped the head over.Good luck .Regards Ron.

[Laird Scooby]

Originally Posted by mrredwards

Hi I have a 240 Torslanda with a B200f engine.I had a cambelt go and it destroyed all 8 valves.I had to buy a good second hand one on Ebay luckily it came with all the valves.Just swapped the head over.Good luck .Regards Ron.

Originally Posted by mocambique-amazone

Torslanda..... seems to be a B200F or B230F with LH2.4

and most of B2x0 are non interference, H and K are.....

good luck, Kay

I reckon you must have been either seriously unlucky with yours or it had previously had a replacement engine and wasn't in fact a B200F as you thought.

As Kay says, the vast majority of B2x0 engines are non-interference, the 16v versions are so you will bend valves but highly unlikely all 16 would be bent and even more unlikely that all 8 valves were bent in yours unless there is something seriously wrong somewhere.

[mrredwards]

Hi Thanks for your reply its got me thinking.I have owned the car for 15 years its an original car but without checking the serial numbers on the car i dont know about if the engine as been changed?I will check it .But when i changed the original head it was very corroded beyond repair.When you say that the vast majority are none interference what do you mean?? When this happened i thought that my head was none interference but i was wrong.Regards Ron