[TR] R&R timing gears, chain and spring

[Jeffrey Barteet]

Hi, Folks,

My '62 TR4 has been in a protracted maintenance cycle these past two 
months, and after completing a front suspension recondition, and 
outsourced rocker assembly and distributor rebuild,  I fired the little 
brute up and realized that the noise I had incorrectly identified as a 
worn rocker assembly a while back was in fact coming from my timing cover.

Uh-oh.

The noise sounds like a very loose rocker, and it goes away when the car 
is revved about 1500 RPM but returns with idle.

I'm guessing the flat spring in there has failed because I was talking 
about that leather seal in the timing cover on front crank pulley a 
month or two back as being something I'd like to replace someday, so the 
car obliged me by giving an excuse to replace said leather seal with a 
modern lip seal. What a thoughtful car.

My question posed to the greater wisdom of the list is:

When I get in there, what all should I replace besides the spring?

I replaced the chain when I rebuilt the motor about 15K miles ago. I 
kept the sprockets.

I seem to recall there being some issue with the new cam sprockets not 
having an offset on the holes where you bolt it up to the cam which you 
could use to fiddle with cam timing.

Do you guys ALWAYS replace everything in there? Has anyone played with 
those spiffy adjustable vernier cam gears?

Thanks as always!

-jeffrey

-- 
Jeffrey Barteet
Systems Administrator
Materials Research Laboratory
University of California
Santa Barbara, 93106