superstator
11-17-2008, 04:38 PM
This may be a stupid question, but...
My 2.25 knocks pretty badly, and blows a lot of black smoke under load. This seems to get worse as it warms up, though it does start relatively easily. From what I've read that all indicates the timing is too advanced, but when I eyeballed the pump the other night it appears that it's already been rotated as far counterclockwise (which retards, right?) as possible. I've also read that the gear that drives the pump tends to settle down as things wear, causing the timing to advance. I'm guessing thats what happened here and previous owners have continued to push the timing back by rotating the pump until we're up against the stops.
So here's my stupid question: given that I will probably replace this engine with something like a 200tdi in the next year or so and don't really want to pour too much cash into it, is there any reason I couldn't shim the pump up a little to get the timing back where it needs to be for the interim? Or is it easier to fix the root problem than I think? Worst case I can leave it for now since it does actually seem to run OK, but I feel sorry for the poor suckers behind me...
My 2.25 knocks pretty badly, and blows a lot of black smoke under load. This seems to get worse as it warms up, though it does start relatively easily. From what I've read that all indicates the timing is too advanced, but when I eyeballed the pump the other night it appears that it's already been rotated as far counterclockwise (which retards, right?) as possible. I've also read that the gear that drives the pump tends to settle down as things wear, causing the timing to advance. I'm guessing thats what happened here and previous owners have continued to push the timing back by rotating the pump until we're up against the stops.
So here's my stupid question: given that I will probably replace this engine with something like a 200tdi in the next year or so and don't really want to pour too much cash into it, is there any reason I couldn't shim the pump up a little to get the timing back where it needs to be for the interim? Or is it easier to fix the root problem than I think? Worst case I can leave it for now since it does actually seem to run OK, but I feel sorry for the poor suckers behind me...