I once bought a 74 Valiant sedan from underneath a highway overpass in Seattle where it had broken down and been parked. It wouldn't start and it turned out the cam had been broken into three pieces. The 904 bellhousing had also been cracked and started to separate from the main body of the trans case. The car had been owned by a teenage kid who told his father (from whom I bought the car) that he as just driving down the highway when the car stopped running. I think more realistically he was doing something stupid like neutral drops or throwing it in reverse while doing 30 MPH+.

Anyway, that is the only time I have even seen or heard of a camshaft breaking in a slant six. And something seriously bad happened to that engine. It was a completely stock car, too.

My point is that I agree that likely all that has happened is the distributor gear broke. That will make the engine lose time (cause of the backfire?) and keep it from running. This is a quick and easy fix. Nowhere near $1800. I could see something like $100 for the whole operation mostly to pay for one hour of shop time.

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Casually looking for a Clifford hyperpak intake for cheap.

This could be really easy. We just need to find a good shop to repair the existing distributor or install one from DusterIdiot.

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Joshua

Sorry its been a while.

SO the car is now in Fresno CA. I only had a day to get it here from washington so I unfortunately couldn't stop anywhere on the way, but here's what Ive figured out

The distributor is fine, the plastic teeth on the end of it are busted which should be an easy fix. I talked to the mechanic again before I left Washington and he told me that the camshaft wasn't broken, but that it was the cam gear or something, where the distributor meets up with the cam.
I talked to a mechanic today here in fresno who told me that for them to work on it they would have to remove the engine and send it to a machine shop in order to figure out what exactly was wrong with it

My thought is this. I can buy a new camshaft, timing set, and valve springs for about 300 bucks. I havnt ever done anything like this at all but Im not seeing any other options other than to do it myself really, unless I can find a place here in fresno that will even work on the car.

This is an easy fix you can do in your garage with a small hammer 1/8" punch, 1/8" drill bit and cordless drill... and Dorman 90450....

Your cam and lifters should be fine, if you are paranoid the chain skipped a tooth, replace the timing set with a new cloyes set... you will need a timing cover gasket...

Too bad you couldn't have stopped in Salem on the way down... I have several 90450 kits, and had the chain and gears you want on the shelf...

Sorry to hear all the mechanics you are plagued with are complete mechanical idiots....

I blame proximity to Seattle. Everyone around here is obsessed with computers and the latest gadgets. Not many are interested in or bother learning about old tech. 64? Is that a Commodore 64?

Replace the distributor gear and fire it up.

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Casually looking for a Clifford hyperpak intake for cheap.

Only if it still runs the Racing Destruction Set Game.....

Yeah, it sounds like at best, the original mechanic assumed that the distributor gear was destroyed by a bad cam gear. But it doesn't take a damaged gear to shatter a 50-year-old piece of plastic. More than likely, he just wanted to charge you for doing an unnecessary camshaft swap and had no proof of the supposed "shavings in the oil pan."

If you're actually concerned about the cam gear being stripped, I'm sure someone here can suggest a good test to rule that out. Maybe hook up a $25 mechanical oil pump in place of the original sender, and use the starter to spin the engine over with the coil unplugged to verify the oil pump still works?

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Somehow I ended up owning three 1964 slant six A-bodies. I race one of them.
Escape Velocity Racing

Today I bought a new distributor. Im going to set it up and see if I can get it to run. If not I would love some diagnosis help on the cam gear but I have a good feeling about the new distributor.

Pull the distributer and with a flashlight look at the cam gear while you rotate the motor by hand with the spark plugs out. If it is chewed you will be able to see the bad gear teeth.

Richard

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Part of Tyrde-Browne Racing

^What he said. If you have trouble turning the engine over by hand, you can install a 3/4"-16 (fine thread) bolt into the hole in your harmonic balancer to give you something to put a wrench on. I think 2-1/4" is the stock length, but 2" should be fine. Clean out the hole with a wire brush and your favorite spray cleaner first. This will be helpful for getting the engine to TDC for distributor installation anyway.

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Somehow I ended up owning three 1964 slant six A-bodies. I race one of them.
Escape Velocity Racing

Did just that. its pretty mashed. Lots of shavings all over the distributor gear as well.

I havent bolted up the new distributor yet (its been 110 degrees here in fresno) if I cant get it to work then is the next logical step is the cam?

If I replace the cam, do I have to re adjust the valve train as well? Its looking like the cam may have to go...

My 65 Dart last Oct stopped 800 miles from home base; turned out the distributor gear had plastic shavings all over it and plastic shavings all over the cam gear.

Turned out the rotor was dragging on several distributor terminals due to eccentric machining of the distributor cap terminals. Finally the distributor gear stopped turning....and timed ignition was lost.

Suggest you do a quick check of your cap and rotor for clearances when doing your other repair of the distributor gear. Suggested steps:
1) put rotor on distributor
2) mark bottom of gear with direction rotor is pointed
3) put on cap
4) rotate rotor and listen for scraping.....trick is to pull the gear toward you (away from the direction that the rotor is pointed. Watch the gear for marking for the rotor direction.

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1965 Dart 110k, 225, Carter BBD Super Six, 2 1/4 single exh., sbp manual scarebird front disc, 7 1/4 rear 2.94 sure grip, 14 x 4.5 OEM wheels, 833 OD with hyd. throwout bearing, HEI, electric fan, ram air/heated air, Accusump. http://plymouthcarclub.com/

If the cam gear is mashed up (METAL shavings), then probably your oil pump gear is trashed too. If plastic shavings, then replace dist or just the dist gear and drive it. You may need pro/experienced help to install the dist properly for correct ign timing.

Do you have oil pressure if you crank the motor over for 30-60 sec? If not, then cam and oil pump will have to be replaced. You will need an old stock oil pump, or one from a board member that is known to have a good gear (NOT brand new from a parts store).

Lou

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