Down she goes

[dreed04]

My buddy and I were riding in his Mach the other night, after replacing a cracked coolant hose on the passenger firewall, when we heard a slight rattle coming from under the hood. We got her back to the house, popped the hood and listened for the noise. Nothing at idle but around 2800 u could hear it. We know it's coming from the passenger head. We removed the valve cover and checked to make sure all was tight. Everything was good to go. We changed the oil and filter bc it was running kind of low and watched her carefully. The next day he we were heading to work, in each others Mach's, respectively. The light turned green and we punched it or at least I did lol. I looked up and he was no where to be found. I made a u turn to find him on the shoulder. He said the car didn't get off the line and felt like the transmission was toast. We let her sit for a few minutes, then she fired right up and drove like nothing happened. Here's where it gets mind boggling. On the way home that day I followed him. We were coming to a stop and his car shut off. He fired it back up. Light turns green, we go...next light, 200yds, we stop...car shuts off again...wtf? Fires her up again. We proceed, get to a stop sign...shuts off a 3rd time...he fires it up and pulls off the road, leaves it running. As we get out our cars, his shuts off a 4th time! This point he is pissed off...poor fella. He said after the 2nd time the car shut off he had to keep his foot on the gas to keep her revved or else it felt like it would die everytime the clutch was pushed in. First thing popped in my head IAC valve. Took the one off my Mach and put on his. Went out for a drive in my Mach with no issues. Put mine on his and it still shut off. Not the IAC. We decided to take her to the Ford dealer the next day, a two mile drive...didn't get there. While sitting at a traffic light, he kept his foot lightly on the accelerator, when all the sudden he said it made a clunk noise on the passenger side and the car shut off...no refire this time. We parked my Mach and pushed his back to his place, 150yds away lol(told u not far). She would not turn over at all this time. Can hear the fuel pump spool but no turning. I grabbed the breaker bar and put it on the Harmonic balancer and cranked. The **** thing would not turn! It didn't budge at all. This leads me to believe that maybe the timing chain on the passenger head snapped and binded up motor somehow...maybe that was the rattle noise we had heard and why the car kept stalling? We haven't taken off the valve cover yet to check but it's my assumption. If this is turns out to be the culprit, what kind of potential damage are we looking at besides the timing chain? Thanks

[DSG2003Mach1]

unfortunately these are interference motors, meaning that if you lost a timing chain it would be very likely that pistons kissed valves

I hope its something else

[watman02]

if the timing chain broke the head will need to come off. how many miles are on the car?

[ASH302]

man that sucks, sorry to hear and that sucks that ya'll had to push it, i hope it didn't mess up alot more after keep starting it and now won't even run
let us know what the update is when you find out what is wrong

ASh

[na svt]

The timing chain will show no symptoms of failing until it does so. Pull the passenger side valve cover and take a look at it.

[768MPH]

Similar thing happened to me in my old '93 Probe GT (2.5 V6)...all expect noises coming from the passenger side motor noise due to transverse mounted engine.

Turns out the distributor shaft was broken and finally seperated.

Let us know what's up.

[dreed04]

We are going to crack the top half half of the motor open next weekend. It only has 58k miles on her I believe. Once we get the Mach opened up I'll report back.

[XSELLR8]

If the breaker bar on the crank wont move (with the car in neutral) I hope the engine didn't have a light seize. Did you see anything coming from the tail pipes (purple smoke?). Was he good about changing his oil?
The only other things that come to mind as possibilities are
Vacuum line
Hydro lock (if coolant somehow got into the intake)
Fuel Pump
Clogged injectors
or as mentioned, some kind of valve train failure.
Good luck