yeh you do. You need to disconnect the sprocket from the camshaft as it doesnt come up with the head and to remove the cam, you need to remove the rocker gear.

Its all good, ive got the head off mine at the moment. going back on tomorrow fingers crossed. Kept on having overheating troubles, but now theres new radiator, new waterpump, new fan centre, new thermostat, new temp sender. Cant wait to drive it again!

1-drain water-coolant 2-remove 1 battery lead 3-remove all plugs 4-turn motor to #1 fire-timing marks line up 5-remove exhaust and intake manifolds-air intake tubes -any wiring,cables 6-remove rocker cover 7-mark front of rocker gear-i dont know if its reversable,and remove 8- tie timing chain to sprocket use 3 ties-cant let the chain drop of crank sprocket and back of tensioner 9-undo sprocket bolt and ease off cam-has pin dowel and key way,may be very stiff , tap or bump with copper-brass or wood to slide off 10-loosen head bolts from centre out equally-reverse to torque sequence 11- tap or lightly rock head sideways to loosen gasket grip-also may have two dowels to locate head on gasket 12=suck it in its a long reach to lift and get the head out by your self its aluminium---cast iron is much heavier!!! 13-after a beer ,smoke or ? the clean up starts 14-look to see how the gasket failed,water seals corroded,blown between the cylinders,why did it fail? 14-check the head for massive corrosion around water passages-if not sure,clean the gasket off and dry very clean,lay the new gasket on head,if the water passages are in side the gasket ,its ok,if past it,it can be tig welded and re cut with die grinder-carbide cutters 15-the head has to be flat with in a few thousands of an inch-it will pull down,but under different torque tensions,if warped to much,re-machine flat,if you cant see why,get head pressure tested-they crack in funny places 16- re-assemble in reverse order,oiling parts as you go,every part is dry,tension head and rocker gear,front sprocket bolt,release or replace tensioner the rest is yours-some nice pics

that looks abit messy

1-drain water-coolant
2-remove 1 battery lead
3-remove all plugs
4-turn motor to #1 fire-timing marks line up
5-remove exhaust and intake manifolds-air intake tubes -any wiring,cables 6-remove rocker cover
7-mark front of rocker gear-i dont know if its reversable, and remove
8- tie timing chain to sprocket use 3 ties-cant let the chain drop of crank sprocket and back of tensioner
9-undo sprocket bolt and ease off cam-has pin dowel and key way,may be very stiff, tap or bump with copper-brass or wood to slide off
10-loosen head bolts from centre out equally-reverse to torque sequence
11- tap or lightly rock head sideways to loosen gasket grip-also may have two dowels to locate head on gasket
12-suck it in its a long reach to lift and get the head out by your self its aluminium---cast iron is much heavier!!!
13-after a beer, smoke or? the clean up starts, look to see how the gasket failed, water seals corroded, blown between the cylinders, why did it fail?
14-check the head for massive corrosion around water passages-if not sure, clean the gasket off and dry very clean, lay the new gasket on head, the water passages are in side the gasket, its ok, if past it, it can be tig welded and re cut with die grinder-carbide cutters
15-the head has to be flat with in a few thousands of an inch-it will pull down, but under different torque tensions,if warped to much, re-machine flat, if you cant see why, get head pressure tested-they crack in funny places
16- re-assemble in reverse order, oiling parts as you go, every part is dry, tension head and rocker gear, front sprocket bolt, release or replace tensioner the rest is yours-some nice pics

sorry guys - camera got stolen, problems borrowing one, so kinda halted more pics! i've stripped the block right out so will continue again soon!

PM me with your email address and I'll send you a complete doco on timing chain tensioner r&r and resetting
Regards Bob

if ur in melbourne id let u borrow my camera

i want to see pictures of how to do it......reading gives me headaches

oi bob or tim....hows this going? its not finished yet =(

dunno if it ever got started lol

i was waiting on the very ugly bobs pictures

lol.......u start it then i might give it a shot...........with my EA engine...even though there is nothign left on the engine for it to start

well, its not hard to take the head off, actually its not hard at all its just a pain in the a** job no heavy lifting etc, just get teh chain tensioner right and it will be all good

I'm in the process of removing the head off an EL XR motor. So I'll try and finish this doco off...for all those who are willing to give it a shot. There was another thread around somewhere about Adam (Till_Lind) replacing his head gasket, good read =D.

Anyways this is what I have gotten up to. Firstly my engine is on a stand, so it will be much easier compared to an engine in the engine bay. So it may seem easier in replacing a headgasket, so it could be a bit harder due to tight spaces in the engine bay. I drained the oil and also removed the rocker previously...wasn't too sure if I should do the headgasket, but while it is out, I might as well.

Anyways I was told to first remove the bolt that holds in a plastic timing chain guide. The bolt can be seen in the picture below. It is found at the front top right of the head. Now you remove this bolt so that you won't forget about it later on. When taking the head off, the sprocket and chain don't go with it. So if you take the head off with the bolt still holding the guide in, the guide will snap and you will have an annoying rattle at ~2000RPM, or worse.



Now you can remove the Timing Chain Tensioner. Now this is the first time I've done any of this...so I'm not 100% what was meant to be removed here. The Timing Chain Tensioner is located on the right of the engine, just above the water pump and below the Power Steering pump. In the picture below you can see where it is and how it looks like. The picture does not have a steering pump or water pump attached so it may look different.



Remove the bolt...just be careful, since it is spring loaded and pops out as soon as the thread ends. Anyways I undid it and this is what I managed to pull out of the little hole (using a magnet).



I am unsure as to what is what in that picture and I am not sure if I actually removed the right part, since there is a smaller bolt with a thread on the end of the big black thing on the right. I just used a socket set to get it out (forget what size) and the whole black thing came out . Hopefully that's right...I'm sure someone can enlighten us on that.

With the tensioner removed, it is time to rotate the harmonic balancer (in a clockwise direction) so that it is at TDC (according to the Gregory's Manual). Not sure what TDC stands for but I have been told by everyone and the handy Gregory's Manual, to do so. There is a mark on the Harmonic Balancer and a TDC marker on the block. The mark on the harmonic balancer should be aligned with the TDC marker...as shown below.



At TDC, the Sprocket gear should have a marker which is level to the head mating surface on the right of the sprocket, as seen in the picture below. If the marker on the harmonic balancer is aligned with the TDC marker and the marker on the Sprocket is not on the right...then turn the harmonic balancer another rotation and the marker on the sprocket should be on the right hand side level with the head. That's what I found anyway...can someone please correct me if I am wrong.



Once all the markers were in the right places I got a cable tie and tied the chain to the sprocket so that they can't jump a tooth.

I jammed a lever into one of the holes in the sprocket to keep it from rotating while I was trying to remove the Camshaft bolt retainer. Make sure that the lever being used, does not use the head mating surface as a leverage. This may cause you to damage the mating surface and when you put the rocker cover back on, you might find it leaking oil . I jammed in mine somehow, and it worked .

Once you managed to find a way to stop the sprocket from turning, use a 18mm spanner/socket to crack open the bolt. You do require a big and quick jolt of force on the bolt so that it cracks open. Once you cracked it, remove the bolt and pull the sprocket off the cam. Let the sprocket and chain lean on the front of the head as seen in the picture below.



I am planning on removing the cam and then sending the head out, so I started to undo the numerous amounts of 10mm bolts that run along rocker gear thingy.

At this point you can refer to the steps on Page 1 to remove the rocker gears. Just make sure when undoing the numerous amounts of bolts, that you start from the ends and work your way in. First just crack open the bolts from outside in, and then slowly loosen them one by one working from the ends. This will put less stress and pressure on the bolts/head. May seem fiddly and time consuming, but better doing it that way then something going wrong. Below is the picture of what I have left it at. I could have removed the rocker gears as one assembly, but I thought I'd do progress pictures while I was at it and didn't realise my camera was out of batteries, so I had to recharge.




Will try and continue on tomorrow if nothing is happening.

Hope this is a bit more progress on this thread...even though the steps on Page 1 have already covered in the removal of the rocker gear assembly.

phong =P~

F**k phongus, my perceived view of your mechanical knowledge just increased 10 fold, nice write up so far!

hahaha thanks cam . I try and do things myself but I think I'm going to need a hand when it comes to timing and putting the tensioner back in

phong =P~

TDC = Top Dead Centre