Help a sad L300 in California, anyone near Santa Cruz please

[TardisDeli]

Hi All, we have some L300 Delica Friends needing advice in California, is anyone driving near San Francisco or Gilroy or Carmel? They are in Santa Cruz, a pretty town on the coast.

We want your Ideas? Suggestions? Tests they should do?

The L300 is an early 1993 gasoline 4G63 engine, the timing belt broke, but it sounds like no damage was done. It felt like a lack of gas, revolutions dropped, engine stopped. When they looked the belt was loose, so they put it back on and restarted the engine just fine, and drove another 1000 km. Sometimes the engine died, but they were still able to restart and drive. Now the timing belt broke completely, it still starts, but dies after a few seconds, so they are not leaving Santa Cruz. The oil is clean, not milky. There is no vibration in the engine. Mechanics in USA don't know the vehicle, so are afraid of touching it. So engine cover has not been opened up, nor have the belts been replaced.

Meantime, Pato and Naty replaced various components that they could do easily, such as coil, spark plug, rotor, battery, carbureter

Today I told them via Skype to find a mechanic over 50 years old, that doesnt rely on the computer screen for diagnosis. I would love a pair of eyes there as we are translating from Spanish to English (Pablo and Anna are visiting here now, so are translating). Pato and Naty are from Argentina (as is Pablo), and for the last 2 years have been travelling South America and Central America on their way to Alaska (via the home of the Tardis Deli Motel, of course).

email lachanchaviajera@hotmail.com

Or anyone know of a cheap tow truck that can tow the van 20 km up to a small town where they have friends.
Cheers, Christine.

[Manitoba deli]

Are they sure it's the timing belt, I don't think its visible without taking off some plastic covers, and if it is completely broke, the engine shouldn't even fire. I could be wrong, but I think the distributer is driven by the camshaft, which won't be turning if the belt is broke. Any chance they can send pictures? Or ask them to look into the oil filler cap and see if the camshaft is turning when cranking it over.

Jason

[jaggedfish]

I am also suspicious whether something has been lost in translation. The fact they visually checked the belt and replaced it themselves, I suspect it might be a fan belt or something of the sort. As Jason mentioned, the van would not run if the timing belt was broken. Sounds to me as though the fan belt has broken and the engine has overheated hence the fact that it will start but not continue to run as it is running too hot. Is likely the belt slipping caused the engine to overheat in the first place and indicative of the belt being ready to fail then when it finally broke there would be not enough cooling happening.

Also, the engine wouldn't run at all if the distributor wasn't turning the rotor as the spark wouldn't get to the plugs. Same if the camshaft wasn't turning.

The fact they were able to check the oil indicates there is no oil leak otherwise there would be no oil to check.

Those are my thoughts... hope they find the problem!
Cheers!
Ian

[jaggedfish]

Another thought.... they should check their coolant levels too. Could be two problems rather than one if there is an overheating problem...

[TardisDeli]

HI All, thanks for all your troubleshooting input (we also had replies direct from the delica community).

So, they have decided to park the L300 there for a few months, as they had planned to return home to Argentina soon anyway for a few months to work. They will research getting a newer engine (there is a huge factory in Chile that imports L300s and converts them to left hand drive, and has shelves full of rebuilt engines). After some more questioning, they agreed there is Mucho vibration, and then they found an older mechanic who did a compression test and found the 2 valves were bent, and 2 cylinders were only about 60 psi, so it sounds like they have done some damage... and yes he agreed he should not have kept driving after the first problems.

Pablo and Anna are driving down to Mexico now, so might meet up with them.
Thanks everyone. Christine.

[thedjjack]

they should be able to source that motor in a usa junk yard. cheep. change the timing belt on new motor, and drop it in (motor swaps are pretty easy)