Timing marks on KJ Laser, need advice please

[kelshouse]

Hello,
Thank you for the advice on how to extract the water pump. I removed the remainder of the front engine mount above the driver side chassis rail and that gave me enough room to manoeuvre it out from the top.

I’ve put the new water pump in and fitted timing belt, pulleys etc. Now I’m checking timing and am confused by the instructions in the Haynes repair manual.

For the DOHC 95 to 96 BP 1.8 engine, the manual provides clear guidance on aligning the cams/gears, which I have done. But the manual does not describe the corresponding crankshaft alignment at that point, for the engine of that year period.

I think (have assumed) that the cam sprockets should be in alignment when #1 cylinder is at TDC, so I have assumed the crankshaft should be in the corresponding right place when the notch on the backing plate of the crankshaft (lower) timing belt sprocket lines up with up with the 12 o’clock mark on the engine case just above the sprocket (ie crankshaft is in TDC position as well). IS THAT RIGHT?

The manual then says to refit the crankshaft pulley boss (sits behind the main crankshaft pulley). It then says to turn the engine 1 and 5/6 turns so that the pin on the pulley boss is at 12 o’clock. When the pulley boss is put on the crankshaft, the pin on the boss is directly in line with the notch at the back of the crankshaft cam belt sprocket. So this implies that before the crankshaft was rotated 1 5/6 turns, the notch at the back of the crankshaft timing sprocket should have been at 2 o’clock.
THIS SEEMS INCONSISTENT WITH HOW I SET THE NOTCH IN THE CRANKSHAFT TIMING BELT SPROCKET AT 12 O’CLOCK WHEN THE CAM SPROCKET MARKS ALIGNED, PER THE PARAGRAPH ABOVE.
CAN ANYONE EXPLAIN THIS?

The manual then says to rotate the crankshaft another 1 and 5/6 turns and align the “timing belt pulley mark” with the “tension set mark”. The tension set mark is on the engine case at 10 o’clock.

I don’t know what the tension set mark and that part of the process is for, and I’m not sure which pulley they are talking about when they say “timing belt pulley mark” (I am guessing they are referring to the notch in the backing plate of the crankshaft timing belt sprocket).

The manual then says to rotate the crankshaft 2 and 1/6 times and check that the crankshaft aligns with the correct mark and the cam sprockets align with timing marks. At this point the notch in the backing plate of the crankshaft timing belt sprocket will be at 12 o’clock aligned to the 12 o’clock mark on the engine case, and the cam sprocket timing marks are also supposed to be aligned at this point. This is the position I used to align crankshaft with camshafts originally, but seems to be inconsistent with the implied position of the crankshaft sprocket prior to doing the first 1 and 5/6 turns of the crankshaft per manual description, ie would have to have been at 2 o’clock prior to rotation so that it would be at 12 o’clock after the first 1 and 5/6 rotation.

CAN ANYONE HELP PLEASE.