Good morning. I just got through putting in a new Oil pan gasget, new timing belt, oil pump kit, and oil filter, in a 2.4 liter, 4 cylinder Chrysler Voyager van. Set the timing perfectly, but the pump wouldnt pump. Got the pump to work, but then the engine wouldnt turn. Changed the Cam & Crank Positioning sensors, but still no luck. Checked the sparkplugs, and found oil in #1 & #3 full of oil!!! What could cause that?? Im at a loss as to how this occured. Ive never experienced this problem with any other vehicle Ive worked on before. So before I get another engine or junk the whole van, Id like to know how & WHY this happened. Does anyone here have any thoughts, or a similar experience. Thanks in advance.

 

About the only way engine oil can get into the cylinders is from oil gallery via cyl. head gasket to combustion chambers. Likely if you've had the head off to change cambelt. You also got hydraulic lock by the sound of it when it wouldn't crank.
If this be the case, it looks like another strip-down. Sorry! Hope it's something else.

Leedsman.

 

Thanks for the reply Leedsman. When we changed the timing belt, we only removed the Harmonic balancer & the sprocket that it was attached to. Initialy we went in to find where a persistant oil leak was coming from, which had only gotten worse. We put in new seal's and a spring in the oil pump. When we put it back together & set the timing (which was perfect), and it started right up, but wouldnt pump the oil. We took it apart again, fixed the pump issue, only then it wouldnt start anymore. Thats when we found out about the oil in the combustion chamber.

 

That's as far as my general auto knowlege goes with hydraulic lock, which is usually water/coolant. Maybe someone else had this effect on a 2.4?

Leedsman.