Distributor gear carnage (not for squeamish)

I went to start my 351 mustang this afternoon. No spark. After some troubleshooting, I determined that the rotor wasn't turnng (NOT GOOD). Pulled the distributor and saw this:



The cam gear looks fine. Is this a 'wrong gear material' problem? Stock '69 Ford Distributor, Comp Cams XE274XEH. Oil pressure was fin last time it ran. Anyone have any clue what the *&^%$ went wrong here?

miamilightning

Looks like your oil pump locked up causing the weakest link to break. Replace your oil pump and especially the pickup which allowed something large enough to lock it up but small enough to pass through. Your pickup bypass may be damaged or stuck open. Do not, I repeat, do not reuse your oil pump pickup. Get a non bypass pickup from parts plus. On a 302/289 the pump drive will twist without breaking the distributor gear but on 351s and larger the gear will break. Your oil pump is trash.

I had the same happen on my 351w, if you installed a double roller timing chain and/or used the 351w thrust plate behind it that may be the cause, as the cam gear will bottom on the block and will groove it, so the cam end play is way excessive. beware that more than likely you wiped out the cam gear as well and sent metal shavings thru your engine. With the 351 thrust plate and some double roller chains this will happen. Mine lasted about 5000 miles. I ended up flushing the motor woth kerosine,compressed air and magnets, new oil pump and screen and changed the oil about every 100 miles for 500 miles. Its still running and oil pressure is not excessivly low. So I had to change the cam anyway so I did a hyd roller conversion. The ford motorsport timing chain seems to be the best fit, some others will hit the block regardless of thrust plate used. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_cry.gif[/img]