Who has folowed the 'How To Change 20v&T Cambelt'

I have both the book by Barnes/Knight and the forum's 'How To' guide on cambelt changing all printed out, so I felt brave enough to give it a go.

I'm now wondering how many people have followed the 'How To' guide to the letter, as it differs to the book (and what Joe has told me on the phone)? I struggle to see how the 'How To' guide can be correct.

The guide is here; https://www.fiatcoupe.net/howto.php?ID=1&chapter=26#content2 I don't know who the author is but is says copyright 'Skinflint Productions'.

The 'How To' guide says to only remove/uncouple the reaction strut/tie-bar (step 6), the engine support by the cam belt & oil cooler [step 8] (says LH mount but that should be RH), and the front gearbox support/mount [step 20] - (which it says is only necessary if doing the water pump tensioners etc). At this point the guides says; "The engine is now quite free to move around". I need to question this as I now have all the engine mounts off plus tie-bar and my engine is most definitely not "quite free to move around" and I can only get an inch and a quarter gap between the engine and the chassis whereas you need about 3 inches.

In the book (p88) it says to remove ALL 3 engine mounts, so this includes the mount at the back of the engine by the exhaust, (plus the tie-bar according to Joe - but the book doesn't seem to mention it), but the book also says to remove the right hand drive shaft hub nut - then "On the left hand suspension strut, loosen both hub mounting bolts and remove the top bolt to allow the hub to tilt". I have not yet tried either of these as yet, but what I can see is that the engine is not going to go very far whilst it is connected to the drive shafts and the drive shafts are fixed to the hubs.

Also, steps 10, 11, & 12 detail to remove a total of 5 cambelt cover ribe bolts, but it only has 4, and step 12 raising the engine, does not get the bolts above the chassis so removal is impossible until a gap is made between the engine and the body. Step 19 refers to 'the resonator' without a picture, or detail as to what 'the resonator' is (exhaust baffle?)

So before I take the remaining steps (up to 58) how tried and tested is the 'How To' guide please? If I am right and the guide needs tweaking, or I have better pictures to offer, is that possible?

I used the PDF guide, here :

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B2CHx_WlD4alMFI5R0I1VEVrSmc

only problem I found was the torque for the tensioners being wrong.

I left the lower mount at the gearbox in place, removed the other 3. I did have to lever the engine over from the top with a long bit of wood to allow full access to replace water pump and adjustable tensioner.

I was doing clutch at the same time so both drive shafts were probably still removed while doing the cambelt,

Now that guide looks much better, (but it is also 'copyright Skinflint Productions'). The fact that the diagram on page 14 of it is the same as used in the 'How To' guide makes me think that whoever put it on the forum used it as a template or cut it down. However, on a quick glance I can see that some things were left out, like on page 15 of this PDF guide it says not to force the 17mm bolt of the gearbox but remove the three 13mm bolts that hold the mount to the chassis. The 'How to' guide did not copy that bit so I now have a sheared off 17mm bolt which is a major problem!

But having gone through the first 15 pages there is nothing about removing or undoing the drive shafts or hubs, so still I'm thinking; how can the engine be "free to move easily" when it's still connected to the drive shafts and the drive shafts are still held by the hubs?

The drive shafts can slide in/out of the inner and outer CV joints at both sides and you're moving the engine more up/down than left/right, so presumably enough movement is possible if you use enough force.

Well, as I said, I have movement that gives me a gap of an inch and a quarter, but Joe says I would need a gap of three inches when doing the water pump and the sensor. I know that the drive shafts do slide in and out of the c/v joints of the hubs to allow for suspension movement, but three inches?

The gap doesn't need to be as big as 3 inches. Use a 3 or 4 foot long bit of wood to lever the engine over, it only needs done for a few seconds each time to get clearance to slide the tensioner and waterpump in. Or just disconnect the drive shafts if you're struggling.

I have done it now. I called in my mechanic friend and we got it done together. It was indeed large pieces of wood that did it, but even with all the skill in the world I don't think I could do it on my own. It takes one swinging on the wood while the the other fiddles the pulleys off and on. I think the the guide linked by GrahamL above is much better than the 'How to' guide found on this forum.

One of the real difficulties I had was getting the two middle ribe bolts of the cam belt cover. Getting a drive bit in there and driving it with a spanner etc. was really tricky. When you think about it, there is no reason at all for the 4 bolts to be ribe other than originality for the sake of it, so I have replaced them with hex socket s/s bolts which can be removed the next time with an allen key, especially if you cut an allen key's short end even shorter.. Fiat never thought about making in-situ belt changing easy because they only recommended engine out changes so they had no reason not to to use ribe.

I don't recall having a problem with those bolts, you need to jack the engine high enough to get some from the top and then drop it low enough to get the others from the bottom via the wheel arch. Overall I didn't find the cambelt job all that bad, considering all the hype built up about it over 20 years. I'd much rather change the cambelt again than do the clutch again, that's for sure. I think I still had the driveshafts out when doing the cambelt though, that probably helps.

I printed the guide and followed it (some years back) and it worked out fine - although not a walk in the park. I kept the driveshafts in place...
Yes the (middle) cambelt cover bolts are a bit tricky. I think I used a small/short bit w toiletpaper inside a spanner (w extension?). Good idea to replace w hex
I remember that the lower engine mount RH in wheel arch gave me troubles. And the mount on gearbox required some fiddling during assembly.
But my engine moved 'fairly freely'.

Cheers
M