Somehow I got talked into putting a new timming belt on my wife's sister's car. Its a 1998 ford Contor 4 cylinder. The timming belt snapped and im just wondering if anyone knows if this thing has an interferance head. I dont want to throw another timming belt on to find out I have to pull the head, and I dont want to pull the head if its not needed. Does anyone know off hand, or know how I can find out without pulling the head? Thanks.

 

do a compression test. if you have good compression you might not have any damaged valves. then put the new belt on and if it runs it runs,

 

Doing a compression test will be difficult because I will have to pull the valve cover and make sure the cams are possitioned for each cylinder. But thats easier than pulling the head. Thanks for the imput!!!

 

set all your timing marks and put the belt on and rotate the crank with a wrench see if you have any contact if not the try startin it.

 

I did one of these like 2 weeks ago. it was a little bit newer, so it was the zetec engine, but it should be similar.

The cam gears actually have no marks, so you have to remove the valve cover to set the cam timing. What I did was take an 8" long piece of angle iron to make the tool to set the cams. On the driver side of the block there should be two slots in the end of the cams, these are offset. Set them so the slot is even with the head (it'll be obvious) and slip the angle iron in to hold them in place. Then I stuck a long screw driver down the #1 spark plug hole and rotated the block to TDC, the pulley marks are known to be off, so the screw driver method is easier. Slip the belt on, tension it, and bolt it all back together.

It is an interference engine, but unless it broke when the engine was reving over 5k (unlikely), you should be fine.

Good luck, PM me if you need any help...

 

update: I put the belt on, timed it and it runs perfectly. It took me six hours, working in the grass, with 90+ temps and beating sun.