Timing off on an 06 Aveo

That American Girl

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Hey fellas...I knew I could come here for an answer...a buddy of mine has an 06 Chevy Aveo that he just replaced the timing belt on, but something went wrong. Here is what he sent me:

"
Hey Tina, I am in deep shit right now and need help. I replaced the timing belt on the car and I was positive I had it timed right and now it's all sorts of jacked up. Not sure how to re time it. TDC for some reason is at 3 and 9 on the drive shaft. What did I do?

He says tension is right, and this one is out of my depth.

Any ideas??
 
I'll probably catch some grief for this statement, but changing a timing belt is NOT a job for someone who isn't an experienced mechanic/tech. As your friend found out, things CAN go wrong.
I'm certainly not a Chevy Aveo expert - I stay as far away as possible from them. That said, if he tried to start it when it was timed wrong, he may be in for some pretty expensive re-fixing. I'm almost certain that these are 'interference' engines, which means that tying to start one with a broken or mis-aligned timing belt can result in bent valves, cracked pistons or worse. My guess as to what he did wrong was simply that he set the timing mark on the crankshaft at TDC, but didn't bother to check the timing marks on the cam gears.
All that said, here's a short video of how he SHOULD have approached the belt change:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmKjlFKq7Xw

Edit: My advice: At this point, the best possible thing that your friend could do is to have the car towed to a trusted, experienced technician. The cams need to be re-synced with the crankshaft and ignition, the new timing belt installed and, at the very least, a compression test should be run. If any questionable results are found, the head should be pulled and the valves and pistons examined. Final note: I hope he also changed the water pump and tensioner. Trying to save money by re-using those components is definitely false economy.
 
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There is a possibility that there is a very specific way that car has to be set to replace the belt. Some cars have gear set ups that allow the belt to keep time while not having the belt run over the same spots on the gears. I know this sounds weird. Have him roll the engine over by hand and see if the marks come back to where they should be.


 
Depending on what engine it is, he may have lunched it. Some of the Aveo engines are interference engines where if you get the timing off by a tooth or two the pistons meet the valves and bend/break. Which engine does he have?
 
GRtak;n3555096 said:
There is a possibility that there is a very specific way that car has to be set to replace the belt. Some cars have gear set ups that allow the belt to keep time while not having the belt run over the same spots on the gears. I know this sounds weird. Have him roll the engine over by hand and see if the marks come back to where they should be.



Note that on some cars it's HUNDREDS of revolutions before it'll line up right again on all the pulleys. When in doubt, just take the belt off and start over. I think it's something absurd like 700 revs on a SOHC Subaru, and "functionally never" on a DOHC.
 
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