67mustang302

.....no

I know what the thrust plate is.

I wanted to know what the actual cam thrust was as measured with a dial indicator. Can't recall for earlier Fords, but later 302's called for .005-.0055 with a max service allowable of .007 iirc.

Post a closeup of the cam side of the thrust plate, it should show 0 wear. If there's any kind of a lip from the cam wearing it down, then your thrust was way the hell off and the cam walked all over the place.

JB65Fastback

I bolted all the parts back together and checked the clearance between the thrust-plate and the the gear and could not get a .005 feeler gauge between them, I've upload pictures of the cam with the gear and eccentric bolted together...still searching for an answer.

https://picasaweb.google.com/johnnyb...eat=directlinkhttps://picasaweb.google.com/johnnyb...eat=directlink

67mustang302

You really have to have the cam in the engine, with the thrust plate bolted on and the timing gear torqued, and measure the thrust with a dial indicator.

emttrevor

I searched for answers and found nothing I finally attacked my fuel pump drive with a grinder and ground a 1/4 inch or so off it so I could get the clearance and wouldnt have a re-occurance. Now Im not saying this is the right thing to do but it worked just fine and has been for about 1000 miles so far. I was lucky to find it when I did I was doing an upgreade on the cam so I put a new cam in and had same issue thats why I did it. I was told by a wise old stanger guy that a late model block and early model timing cover was to blame and that my fix was ingenious some would say stupid though at the same time. Im thinking though that it was right in my case cause it worked..

JB65Fastback

I think I have found the problem, I was searching the net and found the Cam gear part numbers on a "BRYCO" parts list and the cam gear s430 is for a 72-88 255,302std,351w block with a s431 crank gear, my block code is C9OE-6015-c and is a 1969 302 block, and the BRYCO catalog says it should have been a s406 Cam gear and a s431 crank gear, now I need to find the gear facing thickness of the s406 gear to confirm there is a difference.


I have tried to imbed the pictures but I'm forum challenged so here is a link to the gear pictures and the block casting number.

https://picasaweb.google.com/johnnyb...eat=directlink

If anyone has a 65-71 289-302 cam gear they could measure I would be very appreciative.

kalli

with re-assembly I actually meant back into the engine. so you can see how far that hole assembly can move. i mean it looks like even though you had that thrust plate in there the whole camshaft popped out forward the engine

as for the timing gears, I'm not sure off the exact difference but I get a feeling from googling around that they're the same just one of them has a few degrees advance built in. i kinda doubt that one is thicker than the other. and even if it would be, it would need a LOT so that the excenter hits the timing cover.
That said if that were the case you probably wouldn't have gotten the timing cover on the engine without that thing having gaps and leaking like mad.

So I'd say the proper thing to do is still: camshaft back into engine, assemble with timing gear like you normally would and then check what is moving (and how much)

JB65Fastback

I put the old cam and gear back and torqued the bolts to spec and there is no room for my smallest feeler gauge.006, so the cam is is not walking.

I decided to pull the timing cover off my 1969 351W block that I have, and here is what I found, the 351 did have the correct cam gear s-406, the 406 gear is .120 smaller thickness than the s-430 gear, I have enclosed the pictures I have taken of both gears with a micrometer. I believe this is the problem.

Also I checked the pep-boys website and looked up the part number for the 69 302 and they show the s-406 gears as correct.

pictures herehttps://picasaweb.google.com/johnnyb...eat=directlink