When hooked up to diagnostics and it read timing ,could it be that previously th

It wouldn't stay on .it would start but the minute you put in gear it would cut off,finally we were told harmonic balancer ,so we replaced it .then we were having a tune up done to it and mechanic was looking it up to diagnostics for something to do with coil pack,and it showed the timing was the problem ,and since it was a foreign motor and he claims you have to take top part of motor off to set timing he thought it would be better to junk it.but I've had 3 different mechanics tell me that if he bumped a timing sensor of some sort that's located by the harmonic balancer it would show up on diagnostics as the timing whatever ,is this true????

Timing can be a problem, but testing would reveal this. I don't know that a stall when putting into gear would be timing related. Sounds like you need someone near you with experience that can evaluate your vehicle and come up with some results. I'm hearing a lot of guessing but nothing substantial. "Bumping" a timing sensor of some sort -- this is all really a reach. What diagnostic trouble codes have been retrieved, if any?