1.3 liter engine troubles...

Hey peoples,

I do work on several types of cars and have been enlisted to try and fix my friends 97 Metro LSi. I have never worked on one of these before. It will run but just barely. It has no power when under way. Much clatter from valves or lifters. It is also backfiring up into the carb/throttle body once every cycle of all four cylinders or so.

It had some clatter before this and I never got the chance to look into it. I'm thinking in terms of a timing issue or some stuck valves at this point. Figuring on tearing off the head next to take a look but thot maybe somebody who knows these engines could tell me about something specific(and hopefully simple) that might be causing this.

Thanx in advance for any info!

J

It, sounds like your timing belt has streched and jumped a cog or two, remove the cover and see if your timing marks line up as they should.
Good Luck

Yeah that would prolly be a better place to start actually. I got word that she had it towed someplace to have them look at it tho... they will prolly end up charging her as much just to look at it as it would have cost for me to fix it... I guess she didn't want to wait for me to research things. Oh well. Thanx very much for the info tho!

J