Timing belt off a tooth?

[archive@porknet.fdns.net]

Hey folks,

I changed my timing belt and tensioner a couple weeks ago on my 124k 16V
since it had an unknown timing belt history. The old belt was in ok
condition, but had some vertical lines down the non-toothed side. Anyway,
it went like this:

- pulled off belt cover
- pulled off v-belts and pulleys
- pulled off old tensioner (stock!!)
- put new tensioner on
- accidentally pulled off crank sprocket, and embarassingly didn't line up
  the notch when i re-torqued it to bentley-spec 140 ft-lb. good thing
  the junkyard had a crank sprocket they could get me for $15. :( Minimal
  damage to the point where it bolts up to the crank, but I did a little
  filing so it would sit squarely. If anyones curious I took pictures of
  the smooshed notch.
- installed replacement crank sprocket (tightened with belt on and
  screwdriver against valve cover keeping cam sprocket from moving, is
  that ok?)
- pulled off old belt, being careful not to turn cam or crank sprockets
- put new belt on
- tensioned timing belt
- turned engine over by hand 4 times
- ran starter motor briefly several times to double check for interference
- put v-belts, pulleys, belt covers back on
- checked timing, found it was at 4 deg BTDC

after this i concluded the belt change was successful. i haven't observed
a significant decrease in preformance, but it feels (maybe its just
psychological) like the engine is hesistating and the timing feels off. In
addition, i tried to adjust the timing to get closer to 6 deg BTDC, and
found that the distributor had been turned as far advanced as it would go,
physically:

/-\         /-\
|()|       |  |
|  |       |  |
|  |       |()|
 \-/       \-/

That disturbed me, because I know you are -supposed- to be able to advance
the timing to like 10 deg BTDC if you run high octane fuel, etc etc. I
came to think that maybe the timing belt was off by a notch. However I am
unable to verify this, and even if i could, how would I know which
direction it was off? Has anyone in here had prior experience with this
and could tell me in detail how to diagnose and fix this problem?

Thanks,

-Toby

--
'87 Flash Silver Metallic Scirocco 16V

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