Originally Posted by
quik
Thanks for the reply; I hadn't thought of a previous-owner tranny swap. In terms of aligning the other 3 cylinders for TDC, would it be a reasonable solution to take off the timing belt cover, and use the (theoretically) now visible cam gear for TDC reference?
Yea, that is what you can do. On a DOHC, you just take off the valve cover and the middle timing belt cover and turn the crank until the cams line up with each other in the shown positions. For SOHC you can just look at the directions for DOHC, but instead just watch the cam gear turn to the right spot and look at the corresponding cylinder and make sure the cam lobe is fully off of the rocker arm, then ur good to go.