First off, Happy Holidays to everyone, hope it has been good to all!

My dilemma is the timing belt rubs on the front camshaft pulley guard. Initially I thought the tensioner was to blame. Due to its bent piece that has the post which fits into the cylinder head. The post would not be flush with the head, infact it would be away from the head at the top, this I believed caused the timing belt to deflect forward. I have never seen this before. The tensioner stays flush when the spring is not fully tensioned.

I took out the old tensioner, and I could visibly see that piece was bent. I thought this was the problem. So I bought a new tensioner, and timing belt. I still have the same problem although the tensioner is closer to being flush with the head, it is not totally flush.

Removing the guard from the camshaft pulley would fix the rubbing/eating belts problem. But I not sure if that deflection would cause it to come totally off the camshaft pulley and I am timid to try it.

the engine was rebuilt about 1 year ago. 7K total miles on that rebuild. Was done by previous owner, this problem just surfaced about 2-3 months ago when I was diagnosing the warm starting problem.

Any ideas?

thanks

take care

Luke

82 242T 161k miles