15,000 mile 1976 Cadillac Coupe deVille; Images tell the story

[Bloo]

A great opportunity to get rid of that cheap nasty plastic timing chain timing set that will surely fail at the worst possible time, leaving the driver to find another way home and the engine full of shards of broken plastic.

 

I don't believe this is an interference engine.

 

 

Edited March 8, 2023 by Bloo (see edit history)

[Professor]

All,

 

I just merged my Cadillac timing chain thread with this thread and will bring everything up to date.  I have replaced the factory timing chain and gears with a new timing chain and gears and am in the process of putting the front end of the engine back together so I can start troubleshooting the valves.  If nothing else, I am learning the intricacies of the 500 CI engine.  🙂

 

Joe

 

Here is an image of the new timing chain and gears installed.

 

 

[Roger Zimmermann]

How good or bad was the nylon on the cam gear?

[VW4X4]

1 hour ago, Professor said:

All,

 

I just merged my Cadillac timing chain thread with this thread and will bring everything up to date.  I have replaced the factory timing chain and gears with a new timing chain and gears and am in the process of putting the front end of the engine back together so I can start troubleshooting the valves.  If nothing else, I am learning the intricacies of the 500 CI engine.  🙂

 

Joe

 

Here is an image of the new timing chain and gears installed.

 

 

 

I sure hope your  going to do a better job of cleaning up those gasket surfaces.  Seeing this first picture made me a little nervous...  Also, it looks like the timing cover, WAS captive to the oil pan seal?  This was one of the very poor designs on a lot of GM products, back then. If so, there are a few tricks to replace the cover, that I'm sure other know more about this than I do.    Actually these design issues, are why I'll never own a GM product.

 

ERIC

[Roger Zimmermann]

That's correct. That rubber part is dealing the oil pan and timing cover. By removing the alignment pins, the timing cover can be put again on the same seal. After that, the pins are pushed again through the cover into the block.

[Professor]

@Roger Zimmermann  I will take a couple of pictures of the cam gear and upload them shortly.

 

Eric,

 

I will definitely clean up the surface before I install the new gasket.  As Roger noted, the alignment pins are in through holes and can be pushed through the block (and hopefully NOT down into the oil pan… LOL) and then the timing cover can be slid down the surface of the block into the oil pan seal.  Once the timing cover is in place, simply punch the alignment pins back in… easy peasy.  

 

I purchased some Cadillac dark blue to repaint the timing cover, water pump, valve covers, and alternator bracket. I was hoping to get the timing cover painted today, but it is too cold for painting so I will be cleaning everything up and will paint it when the weather warms up a bit.  Worst case, I can turn on my shop heater and paint indoors if I need to.

 

Joe

 

2 hours ago, VW4X4 said:

I sure hope your  going to do a better job of cleaning up those gasket surfaces.  Seeing this first picture made me a little nervous...  Also, it looks like the timing cover, WAS captive to the oil pan seal?  This was one of the very poor designs on a lot of GM products, back then. If so, there are a few tricks to replace the cover, that I'm sure other know more about this than I do.    Actually these design issues, are why I'll never own a GM product.

 

ERIC

 

[Roger Zimmermann]

When I bought my '72 coupe, I was aware of this issue; I let do the work in the US because I did not want to do that. Brian, the guy who did the work, put at my demand, the distribution parts into the car. The nylon, with about 20K miles, looked like new.

[Professor]

@Roger Zimmermann,

 

Here are a couple of snapshots for the front and back of the gear… I would say it is as close to perfect (15k miles) as it could be.  I do not see any indications of pending failure.  This said, I am happy to be rid of it, even though it is not the cause of my current failure to start / no compression /intermittent compression issue.

 

Joe

 

 

[Roger Zimmermann]

Yes, it's looking good! For how long? I have a friend in Switzerland who has a '71 Fleetwood with a high mileage. He is not aware of that issue and never had a problem. It's like a gamble: you may loose but sometimes you win!

[Professor]

Relatively speaking, this is an easy and relatively inexpensive job, so I am glad to get it out of the way.  Regardless of whether I kept this car or sold it, removing this potential weakness is a good thing.

 

8 hours ago, Roger Zimmermann said:

Yes, it's looking good! For how long? I have a friend in Switzerland who has a '71 Fleetwood with a high mileage. He is not aware of that issue and never had a problem. It's like a gamble: you may loose but sometimes you win!

 

[Hans1]

I enjoyed all the car's pictures. So nice to see things we built, not just in memories-mind.

Quality Final Line Buy Off at Cadillac's Fleetwood plant and Final Line Buy Off at Clark Street.

 

The comments are interesting, they are all in retrospect. There were a very limited number of greenies 47 years ago.  The strong opinions also reflect on every age of our clubs cars.