Distributer Exploded, Have you seen this before? And do you have a spare? Options

[Millerwelds]

2.0 Djet. I changed out the plate due to a disconnected ground about a year ago and cleaned and lubed everything at that time. It has worked fine since then, til yesterday. Went to start the car and it did not sound right. Then no spark. Fiddled with a few things to make sure the wiring on the coil did not rattle loose etc, tried again and the distributer rotated 180 degrees and exposed this fancy new hole.

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/ar15.gif)


Towed it home and dismantled the distributer this morning to find the following.




It had been wearing away for a while based on the metal shavings. The shavings are not brass / bronze from the normal wear of the rotor /cap.



Notice the wear on the FI trigger points plate too



Part numbers for reference



Here is a picture of the car for good measure. She looks real good (sitting in the garage!) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/headbang.gif)

[green71]

bigkensteele is right about splitting the case. The brass drive gear is tatered now after its run-in with the steel drive shaft. Even if you could flush the chunks & shavings out of the engine, the two gears might not engage in a trustworthy manner. Judging from how my drive gear looked when I removed it, the poor fit between the gears would lead to more brass shavings over a prolonged period, meaning you might have to replace a bunch of parts instead of just one.

Stiff upper lip! This is an opportunity. Go kick its butt.

Mark

[Millerwelds]

bigkensteele is right about splitting the case. The brass drive gear is tatered now after its run-in with the steel drive shaft. Even if you could flush the chunks & shavings out of the engine, the two gears might not engage in a trustworthy manner. Judging from how my drive gear looked when I removed it, the poor fit between the gears would lead to more brass shavings over a prolonged period, meaning you might have to replace a bunch of parts instead of just one.

Stiff upper lip! This is an opportunity. Go kick its butt.

Mark

I was under the impression that the drive gear on the distributer side was brass while the gear on the cam was steel. After cleaning up the distributer drive gear I now see that it is steel and shows almost no wear. Which means the trashed gear is the one on the cam. Fuch! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sad.gif)

I guess I will be splitting the case. I am tremendously glad to have had everyone's help in figuring that out before really screwing things up.

It has been 20 years since I rebuilt a type 1 so I will have a lot of questions.

[r_towle]

bigkensteele is right about splitting the case. The brass drive gear is tatered now after its run-in with the steel drive shaft. Even if you could flush the chunks & shavings out of the engine, the two gears might not engage in a trustworthy manner. Judging from how my drive gear looked when I removed it, the poor fit between the gears would lead to more brass shavings over a prolonged period, meaning you might have to replace a bunch of parts instead of just one.

Stiff upper lip! This is an opportunity. Go kick its butt.

Mark

I was under the impression that the drive gear on the distributer side was brass while the gear on the cam was steel. After cleaning up the distributer drive gear I now see that it is steel and shows almost no wear. Which means the trashed gear is the one on the cam. Fuch! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sad.gif)

I guess I will be splitting the case. I am tremendously glad to have had everyone's help in figuring that out before really screwing things up.

It has been 20 years since I rebuilt a type 1 so I will have a lot of questions.

Its actually driven off the crankshaft.
Its not super hard to get this done.
Hunt down a good use distributor drive gear so you have it ready and after you crack the case, bring the crankshaft to the machine shop for polishing.
Part of the process is to remove the drive gears and main bearing on the end of the crank so it will mount up in the machine.

Bottom line, the machine shop can do this for you when the time comes.

If you want to, you can easily remove all the pieces with one gear splitter and a small mapp gas torch....

You will need a new gasket kit.
New main bearings
New rod bearings
New front and rear main seal.
New distributor gear for the crank.

One long weekend you can pull the motor and split the case to get the crank out.
Then get it to a shop to get polished.
You spend your nights cleaning out that case and cleaning up all the parts.

Then the following weekend, bolt it back together....

It does not need to turn into a 6 month restoration project...and its really not a huge deal to do this if you stay focused.

With these new motors and rubber bands that drive the camshafts, IC my son doing a new head job on at least one car per month...and that is a major piece of work.

They get in, get out and move on as quickly as possible.
Every head he does has bent valves, cracks...lots of damage.
Its why machine shops exist.

Just put your head down, dont dream big, and fix what got broken so you can enjoy the car (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Whatever you do, dont start thinking about more power.



Rich

[Millerwelds]

Since I have to tear this apart I am thinking larger cam, bigger pistons, dual 44 carbs instead of FI.... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/idea.gif)

Just kidding. Thanks Rich for the breakdown. This engine was built by SilverBullit (Jason) before he decided to go with a 6 and then decided to get out of 914's altogether (I think). Anyway he knew what he was doing and I doubt the engine has 15,000 miles on it so the plan is to take it apart and fix it and slap it back together ASAP. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/driving.gif)