360 Timing Belt Failure – Cam Variator Question

Hi everyone,

unfortunately I had a timing belt failure on one bank of my 360. The affected head will be rebuilt by my machine shop, but I’m unsure how to best proceed with the cam variator situation.

My car has the later engine with the updated variators from factory. My original plan was to keep the camshafts assembled with the pulleys in order to avoid a full retiming of the engine, since it had been properly timed before.

I noticed is that the marks on the variators don’t line up perfectly (see attached picture). If I understand the workshop manual correctly, you’re supposed to tap the camshaft side with a rubber mallet to free things up. I tried that with the assembly in hand, but it didn’t have any effect.

Has anyone here been through this and could share some advice on the best way forward?

Thanks in advance for any guidance!

Andy
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Thanks for the reply!

My car was produced after VIN 123399, so I believe it came with the newer variators from factory. I’ve now read up on the timing procedure and agree that it’s relatively straightforward to do with the engine out, so I’ll definitely go ahead with it.

What still worries me a bit are the variator markings not lining up perfectly. I guess at worst it would only throw the timing off a tiny bit, but it’s still something that caught my eye.

Do you happen to know if the variators can be rebuilt (taken apart and cleaned), or are they considered sealed units?

 

Thanks for the links. I understand the basic function of the variator, but what concerns me is that if it isn’t currently in its zero position, the timing could end up being off once it resets—assuming it resets at all. Given some of the “Ferrari quality management” I’ve seen recently, I could also believe this is just considered normal.

And yes, I’ve done the timing belt not too long before (successfully). This failure wasn’t related to that work, but rather to road debris getting into the belt drive and completely shredding one belt

 

You’re absolutely right — a red circle would have made things clearer.

To clear things up, I reread the section in the manual and have to correct myself. Based on the picture I was under the impression that the outer notch should sit centered between the two inner notches. However, according to the text it’s actually supposed to look more like it does in my case. So I guess it’s a false alarm.

For future reference, here’s the relevant text and image from the manual:

The timing variator is provided with positioning marks on the camshaft side. In the event of malfunctioning or overhauling, the rest status (disabled phase) must be checked to ensure that the reference mark (E) on the part connected to the camshaft matches the one (O) on the part connected to the pulley. If this is not the case, use a rubber hammer and strike the end of the pin splined to the camshaft, thereby permitting its rotation and alignment of the marks.​

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