GM V6: Timing Chains & Rich/Lean Codes - Part 1 

Wow! I never in a lifetime thought you could electronically check for a loose timing chain. This is 1000x cool Ivan! This has got to be the most advanced diagnosis for a chain I have ever seen! Bravo!

On these high feature chain jobs you should also change the valve cover gaskets for the revised ones which help deal with pcv issues and burning oil which also contribute to chain stretch if people aren’t as up on there oil changes

The process you followed totally made sense. The simple diagrams really clarified the impact of a stretched chain. Really nicely done. I hope you make a road trip towards Texas sometime, trying to track down an elusive small evap leak on Chevy 6.0.

Thank you Ivan. Good job, but I demand a recount on those angles. LOL. Have a blessed and safe week to you and your family.

Glad to see you and I thought the same on an Equinox V6. I diagnosed for another Veteran Society. using your exact method. Not as many codes as yours. They elected on a crate motor.

Part 2 I'm waiting, and what a great teacher you are!!! Thanks.

all makes sense when watching this, and it's great that there's so much data provided by the car manufacturers and available via scanners, but who other than Pine Hollow would have the wherewithal to accurately interpret the data, let alone have the technology? Way beyond mere mortals, so...dang who you gonna find to work on your weird problem? I don't know any with this level of skill.

Ivan very interesting ,looking forward to the repair.

Disabling bi-directional control of the VVT system, when codes are present that are indicative of timing chain stretch, makes sense. This is especially so if activating the VVT, combined with the effects of chain street, could result in interference between valves and pistons.

Waiting for part two. You lost me when you turned the key Lol. Good video Ivan will watch again to understand better. Stay safe and well 😊

You’re a great mechanic. Thanks for explaining this, I learned a lot.

Excellent analysis Ivan !!!! 👍👍

Well your video helped me replace my chain tensioner on my 2000 Vitara, so i guess the 2008 era Vitaras are in for a treat.

Great analysis Ivan!

On BMW and MINI, it's possible to read out the stop position of the camshafts. Also, it takes bout 10 minutes to take of the valve cover and put the timing tool on. Therefore, I almost never do the manual crankshaft-camshaft synchronization measurement. I see it as a big waste of time.

I love you! I wonder all those people who thumbs down, they must be the kind of people that when they look at themselves in the mirror in the morning, they must have a long conversation...

Ivan, I must say, holy wow! Great Diagnostics!! You covered it all. I learned lot on your testing and degrees! Interesting stuff 🤔!! I really enjoyed this video a lot. Taught me how to do it! Can't wait for part 2! Want a full timing job video if customer approves the job! Hopefully you will do the in depth. I yarn for that lol!! Freaking awesome job, Ivan! You rock, bud! Many thumbs up :)

Always doing great 👍

Great analysis.

Looking forward to part 2... Ivan, plan a road trip to New Hampshire... I sure could use ya.... LOL

My grandfather drives an Australian built 2005 model Holden VZ Commodore which is fitted with the 175 kilowatt GM-HOLDEN LY7 (aka Alloytec) 3.6 litre V6 engine which has done over 430,000 kilometres (267,000 Miles) & it has the camshaft phasers fitted onto the inlet camshafts only,it has done a lot of country driving & barely any city driving,all of the engine is original & so are the timing chains. They fitted exhaust camshaft phasers.onto the 190 kilowatt engine in the SV6 sports version, later they pushed 210 kilowatts out of the engine in the 2006-2013 model Holden VE Commodore & the 2013-2017 model Holden VF Commodore. A mechanic in Australia found that the crankshafts timing chain sprockets keyway was worn out in a VE Commodore that he was working on & it was causing an out of range issue with the crankshaft & camshaft position sensor,they had a lousy small pin in the crankshaft which was the key & I don't know why they changed it over from previous designs. The point to all of this is it seems that stop/Start city driving will cause the timing chains & sprockets to wear out quicker than if the car was used for country driving. I seem to prefer the older design for the timing chain & sprockets as in my 5.7 litre Chevrolet LS1 V8 engine !

Nice diag Ivan. Thanks!

Another awesome video bro. We love you here in Altoona

Christ. You live in such a beautiful portion of the country... Very jello!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sir u r explan very clear

Piston to valve clearences would have me concerned doing a manual activation like that. Maybe you mentioned it and I missed it. I found a broken flex plate using this method. The crank sensor teeth where part of it.

I just read an article in motor magazine on how a plugged CAT on one bank will cause the rich/lean fuel trims. It has to do with the MAF providing base trim for both banks but the restricted bank is actually getting less air so that bank is rich. This issue is very similar.... valve timing looks like a restricted exhaust. I just got the same scan tool, Does anybody find the PID display and recording rate to be slow.... 1 second, independent of how many PIDS you choose? Or am I missing something here?

is not 7 gr/sec maf too high at idle?

Man, what a job to diagnose. Ivan, hypothetical question... Would there be a point at which that peculiar series of codes would let you conclude a timing chain problem with less confirmatory diagnosis?

You had me pausing to think about this, replaying, thinking some more. Great point about how parts farther down the length of the chain will be delayed more, or advanced less if measuring in the opposite direction. I never considered that. The complexity of this diagnosis is mind boggling, I was thinking about MAF and O2 sensor issues. I wonder how working shops make this diagnosis, it seems much more complex than most shops are prepared for. Is there a quick way to measure chain slack rather than using a four channel scope?

Would you also recommend a waterpump seeing as you are pulling it anyway?

I need LOTS of scope practice and known good waveforms!

I have to admit that i got lost on the pico recordings. Too much going on, smoke coming out of my ears ha ha :-D.

Hey Ivan this might sound stupid but I just had a Saturn with these timing codes and just for the hell of it I checked the oil and it was way low . I did a synthetic oil change and only about 3 quarts came out . Maybe a little less . It takes almost 6 quarts I think 🤔 It was , I know it was more than 5 . I filled it and drove for a week and no problems at all .

I suppose another variable is that the timing chains have been serviced before, and the camshafts were not properly timed by the mechanic.

What happened to the xl7? I think you said you will find a way to fix the timing chain tensioner. More videos for xl7 please ^_^

If I saw those mess of codes I woulda just chucked the you need a timing chain special at him

Ivan With the fuel trim for b2 at 25-30% range surely b2s2 would be reporting rich Basically the downstream telling on upstream and comparing both sets of o2 sensors data and both sensor on b2 wasn’t working properly like bank 1

roller chain doesn't stretch it wears .the wear makes the chain longer. lots of moving parts in roller chain.

People complain about timing belts snapping but at least i can change mine in the back yard inside an hour. Triple timing chains! No thanks!

From watching your channel and Eric O’s channel it seems GM doesn’t allow for a lot of variance in degrees of correlation between the cam and crank sensors.

Looks like another case of synthetic oil every 5,000 miles would save money down the road.

With that engine from that year; I'm surprised it's not on its third or fourth timing set by now

I think that a valve that is not closing properly or fully at idle or when driving is making it run rich do to a stretch chain and why isn't there something programmed into the computer that will turn off the car if the chain stretches a certain amount and can you buy a aftermarket upgrades chain so that it would last forever like they used to

Could the dirty oil cause the big swing? Maybe change the oil and filter a couple times and recheck.

Like #225 Thanks for the video!

I Suzuki covering the cost on this at all? I just put new tires on a car with 81k that is now throwing P0366 and P0008

There's a banana in the tail pipe. Bring it in, Drain oil, 50-50 ATF-Kerosene + new filter, high idle 1,500 RPM 30 minutes. REPEAT. Spill & fill, new filter, correct full syn oil 0w-20 ALL new O2 sensors + plugs Ship it.

I wondered why the 2023 Kia Sportage looked so familiar, then this popped up.

Привет, Иван! А на этих моторах поршни любят встречать клапана? Если они не в то время пришли. А в дате нету данных по углам как у субарей?

How does one account for the bank 2 LT fuel trims (bank 2) pegged at 30%?

I read a tsb on the 008 009 017 and 18 code for gm it said that the tone ring on the crank can spin and cause all of it the fix is a new crank they go in detail on how to verify that.

I have a similar XL7, the 2007 model. It has only one code P0008 for the past 7500 miles and it comes and goes on its own. If I clear the code it actually stays off for a little while, even with highway driving.

And the O2 sensor is good or bad

Did the pistons hit the valves?

Is this engine an interference engine or not? If the oil is changed regularly, why would the chains stretch and fail? My wife and I had a 04 Corolla and at 330 000 kms it was still running like new. I did change the oil every 8 000 kms and the engine was problem free. My 2013 Tacoma had 170 000 kms and again no engine problems at all. I never see these problems on any Toyota I have owned. Is it an example of poor maintenance vs good maintenance?

😊

Been there done that job😡👍😂

Great job should be a teacher

At 156,000 miles it's probably had the chains replaced at least two times. I've done them at 18,000 miles.

Good job proving a stretched chain...It looks more like timing Chains are no better than timing Belts...Just change one Belt every 105K miles instead of 3 Chains a pair of guides every 150K miles...What is the typical parts/labor for each type?

90k...nice...100k button code pending. :-)

Some GM vehicles with chain issues supposedly you have to pull the motor, what a horrid design.

What a poorly designed engine and thank you for the great video well done

Chains Guides Tensioners Idlers Phasers O2 Sensors Plugs Oil & Filter Catalytic Converters Then move on to the other codes? Holy Cow.

dont forget water pump

When a gm 3.6l shows cam correlation codes for all 4 sensors...yup your fucked...

I would take a single chain small block Chevy any day of the week . My 5.0 van had 199 K when the transmission went . There is too much over engineering on this . I will consider going EV in the future . It would be less to put in a crate single chain engine every 250 K than deal with this . Just imagine paying for chains if it was only a VVT solenoid ? Some shops are overgrown quick lubes with a code reader . And the models where the engine has to come out ? Putting 2 K to 3 K into an engine with 150 K doesn't add up . POS . Great diagnosis .

Looks like the timing chain job will cost $2000 for a car thats worth $2000.

go back to the 3800 ,,new cars are junk

The ECM already told you what the problem was. This is a known issue that happens with this engine type all the time. By the time you spent diagnosing the car because you didn't believe the ECM was capable of self diagnosing a mechanical timing fault the chains could have been replaced. By the way the other shop that told him he needed timing chains was correct and I would bet they didn't spend 2 hours time wasting the customers money to diagnose it. There are times that you need to get involved into diagnosis with scan tools, scopes and other equipment and this was not one of them. It seems you have spent alot of money on diagnostic equipment and to justify it you use it on everything you come across. A good technician knows when all of that time to verify a concern is justified. I sure hope you didn't charge that customer for all that wasted time.

Why the hell does a Japanese company have American company engine and to make it worse the worst GM engine from what I hear and they brought it to no better man than Iven to fix it

Utterly garbage engineering.