edicer2 Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 So I was just driving around not beating on my pathy at all then all of the sudden i hear a constant click for about 10 feet an then the engine shut off and i coasted to a stop. Now when i try to turn it on it just spins freely and a few of my car buddies think my timing belt broke. It has 200k miles and i have only owned it the last 30k so idk if the belt was ever changed. When the belt goes on these things does it normally do alot of damage to the internals or not really? like i said the starter spins it freely and it didn't sound like anything was bent but its hard to tell. Anyone got a new motor they want to sell for cheap that they know runs good or is its cheaper to just have a buddy rebuild it for 35 an hour. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
88pathoffroad Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 Take off the distributor cap and crank it. If the t-belt broke the rotor won't spin. If it did break, you might have gotten lucky and not hurt anything (low speed, low RPM). If not, you may have bent valves and dinged pistons or even a broken camshaft. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MY1PATH Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 (edited) if it is realy bad I'd say its time to swap in a vg33; pretty much the same engine but with a bigger bore and can usually be found for less than 2g and under 70k miles. why go with a new stock motor when you can go 10% larger for the same price? Edited November 7, 2008 by MY1PATH Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedPath88 Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 why go with a new stock motor when you can go 10% larger for the same price? Because if your buying used and you need to get it back on the road you gotta go with what you can get and VG30's are normally easier to find And a used VG30 for 2g's.. you would have to be nuts to pay that! Anyway, yes if you got "lucky" there is no damage... that is if the belt broke. But even if there is it may only be valve damage which would also be lucky, just not as Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edicer2 Posted November 7, 2008 Author Share Posted November 7, 2008 ok well i was only going about 25 mph at 1500rpms so it wasnt like i was on the highway crusing. but is there anyway to check for the broken internals besides tearing it apart and if it exspensive to fix that? Or am i better off just looking for a new motor. Only big debate is my rear passenger side frame is rusting out so idk if its worth putting 700 bucks into it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Terrano1992 Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 ok well i was only going about 25 mph at 1500rpms so it wasnt like i was on the highway crusing. but is there anyway to check for the broken internals besides tearing it apart and if it exspensive to fix that? Or am i better off just looking for a new motor. Only big debate is my rear passenger side frame is rusting out so idk if its worth putting 700 bucks into it. Remove upper front half of timing belt cover and look to timing belt. If you see broken belt - most probably, you have from one to all 12 valves bent. Next step, if belt is not broken. Take any marker, put mark on outer belt side and rotate crankshaft, until you see mark again (one full turn). Inspect belt teeth during rotation. If you see "tear-out" teeth - possible consequences are the same as with broken belt. And final step is all 6 cylinders compression test. If you have bent valves - you also have very low compression in this cylinder. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edicer2 Posted November 7, 2008 Author Share Posted November 7, 2008 (edited) ok well its snowing here and i dont have room in the garage so im going to trailor it to by buddys shop and see what we can come up with. If it looks like bent valves and bad belt ill probably just buy this motor thats sitting on a shelf at the junk yard about 20 mins from my house for 250$. What do u think is that worth it? Or how much does it cost to do the rebuild yourself? Edited November 7, 2008 by edicer2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Simon Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 To buy new parts, plus your time, far more than $250 for the motor, and swapping it out. If it's a known good motor, recondition it on a stand and then dump it in. Do headers, timing belt et all, and anything else that's tough to do with the motor in the truck. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
94extreme Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 never heard of anyone ever getting lucky with an interference engine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
adamzan Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 Build a VG34 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Precise1 Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 How close is this to you? http://www.nissanpathfinders.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=20277 B Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edicer2 Posted November 7, 2008 Author Share Posted November 7, 2008 (edited) ok well i guess ill see what exactly is all wrong with it when i get it to the shop and go from there. Ill check and see how close that is from me im in MN. Im just tring to fix it for as cheap as possible because idk if the frame is going to make it another 2 winters its getting bad im going to try to weld angle iron to the side to beef it up but its pretty bad. I bought the pathy for 500 bucks a few years ago with a bad manifold leak and broken radious arm and i have put alot of time into making it look good and fixing most of the rust(besides the frame im not good at welding). SO i would like to keep it but if its going to uned up costing a lot tofix it i might just junk it and try to find a new one with out frame rott edit: probably not going to get that one for 600$ its 1,200 mi which is about 20hours away lol Edited November 7, 2008 by edicer2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
88pathoffroad Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 So...does the rotor spin or not? It's a real easy test. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edicer2 Posted November 7, 2008 Author Share Posted November 7, 2008 sorry im not very mechanically inclined as you can tell. All ik is that when i try to start it all the belts move but it feel like its just spinning the engine. if that makes sense. it almost sounds like the starter is just freely spinning and not attached to anything but it is and turns the motor enough to turn the belts. DOes that help? I havent looked it much since last night it was like close to 11 by the time i got it home and was tired. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Simon Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 Nope....all those are driven by the harmonic balancer. You need to pull off the distributor cap to check to see if the rotor is moving. If not the belt stripped or snapped. Either way, that's not good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edicer2 Posted November 7, 2008 Author Share Posted November 7, 2008 ok well im not going to be able to do that until i get it to my buddys shop its snowing to much to do it outside. When i get more info ill update this so i can let you guys know what actually happened. Thanks for the advise so far. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edicer2 Posted November 10, 2008 Author Share Posted November 10, 2008 well im pretty sure im just going to junk this car. My buddy is going to buy the tranny then i might just part the rest of it out. has bad frame and bad motor so probably wont get @!*% for it at the junk yard. If i decide to part it out anyone interested in buying parts? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedPath88 Posted November 11, 2008 Share Posted November 11, 2008 never heard of anyone ever getting lucky with an interference engine. I lucked out (in the way of valve meeting pistons) when I had a camshaft broke Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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