Timing Belt Change by Funkytuqe
Timing Belt Change by Funkytuqe
writeup copied and pasted from sources outside CPC.
Try to find a Helms manual (not Haynes I have one and it sucks) or a Honda Service manual.
The hardest part is getting of the bolt that holds on the crank pully, once you have that off the rest is cake, so I would suggest that you try that first before you go any further since you can not take off the timing cover without taking off the pully first.
1- jack up the front drivers side of the car at a minimum or the whole front end if you like and make sure you use jack stands and not just a jack for safety.
2- take off the front drivers side wheel (unless you live in Australia or England then it would be the passenger side) or left front wheel if you will.
3- in the back of the wheel well there is a plastic plug that allows you access to the engine bay right where the main crank pully bolt is.
now this where you ay want to stop. Are you sure that the timing belt is broken??? here is how you can tell for sure:
Take off your valve cover, there are three 10mm bolts across the top holding it on. The cover may be stuck on there pretty good so you may have to pry it off with a screw driver but be careful not to damage the head in the process by scratching the valve cover to head surface or else you may run into a leak later on. Then take off the top timing cover, there is one 10mm bolt on each side. Now you should be able to see the cam timing gear and timing belt. Now get your ratchet with a long extension and a 17mm end and put your car into neutral. Now put the 17mm end through the whole in the wheel well and on to the pully nut. Turn the nut in a counter clockwise direction, this will turn the whole bottom end of the motor, since that bolt is directly connected to the crank and bottom timing gear. As you are turning the motor, you should see the cam gear turn as well, if not, you have a broken timing belt. If it does turn, you have something else wrong with your car.
Ok now that you have determined that you definitely have a broken timing belt you may proceed.
4- ok you are going to need a friend for this one if you have a manual 5spd lude. Put the lude in 5th gear. Have your helper stand on the brake as hard as he can. This will prevent the motor from turning when you try to "break" the crank pully nut.
5- now try to undo the crank pully nut in the normal counter clockwise direction, if you have an impact gun this should not be a problem since an impact gun will usually do the job of breaking it loose. If not this is where the not so fun part is. Take your ratchet (1/2 inch drive is best but a 3/4 could work just not as strong) and the longest extension you have or many together. Now place the ratchet 17mm end onto the nut and grab yourself another jack stand or log or something to support the ratchet extensions and ratchet. You need this since you will be jumping on the ratchet to try and break loose the crank pully bolt. Hopefully you have enough extension so that the ratchet end can reach the 17mm bolt and still have the ratchet handle outside the wheel well with the jack stand supporting it. I hope this makes sense because I am having a hard time explaining it.
6- find your self a long bar or something that will fit over the ratchet handle and give you some leverage. Now jump on the bar and try to break loose the nut (counter clockwise) this may take some time and can be really frustrating, JUST DONT STRIP THE CRAK PULLY NUT!!! If you do then your hooped, that is why you have to support the ratchet perfectly in line with the nut with the jack stand or whatever. It is helpful to have another helper hold the ratchet in place so it does not slip while your giving her hell jumping up and down. When it breaks loose, give a nice sigh of relief and take a break. Leave the bolt in place, don't actually remove it until later.
I just like to do this first because it is the hardest part and some people can't break it loose and have to tow it to a mechanic to take out the bolt and then tow it home again to finish the job. Just keep at it and you'll get it, trust me!! I'm gonna scan the pages now and finish this how to later.
Ok, so you got the bolt off ok?? I have tried to upload the pages but the files are too big, the page says a max of 2Meg but the pages are 6Meg each (2 pages). I don't want to make them any smaller or else you may not be able to read the text. If you have an e-mail that i can send them too, that would work.
7- remove alternator belt. I hope you don't have pwr steering of AC, i don't know how that interfears with the removal of the main timing cover since i have never worked on a PS or AC 2g lude, if you do, you must remove the accessory belt and you might have to unbolt the ac compressor and Pwr steering pump, just look and see if it is in the way of the timing cover.
8- Now that the belt (or belts) are off you can take off the main crank pully. So remove the bolt. When you take the bolt off you will see that the pully is held in place by a little metal key. the pully just slides off and may take some working to get off. VERY IMPORTANT: as you slide off the pully keep track of the little metal key and DO NOT LOOSE IT. It may fall inside the timing cover when you slip off the pully, thats OK you can retreive it when the cover comes off. What you can do is rotate the crank pully with the wrachet so that the key is on top, that way it has less chance of falling somewhere when you slide off the pully.
9- get yourself some sort of tray and put the crank pully key and any bolts you have removed on to it and keep it out of the way, you don't want anything to go missing, especially the key!!!!
10- with a 10mm wrench or wrachet remove all of the bolts holding on the main timing cover. Put all bolts on your tray.
11- Ok, now get your jack and a small piece of ply wood or two by four. Place the jack under the oil pan with the wood so you don't dent or break anything. Put up the jack so that it is snug aginst the oil pan. You have to do this because we are going to remove one engine mount and you will need to support the motor.
12- Dissconnect the left side engine mount. It is held together by 3 bolts they are about 14mm if i remember correctly, one through the cassis and two through the motor. Take all three bolts out and take care to remember wher they go, the chassis bolt is a bit different, place them on your tray. OK, now that the bolts are out, slide the mount towards the chassis (away from the motor) towards you and leave it there, don't actually take it out, we just need it out of the way. If it is too tight to move, lower the jack that is supporting the engine to give you the space.
13- Take out the timing cover. It may be a bit of a bitch to wiggle out, you can lower or rais the motor with the jack to give you the space you need. Also there could be a couple of rubber seals that hinder things a bit. One round one that seals off the tentioner bolt and one rectangular one where the engine mount is. Just reaf on the cover so they slip over the tentioner nut and/or engine mount. Also find the pully key if you dropped it inside the cover while takeing off the pully.
OK so your %40 done, you should see the timing belt and where the failure occered. Most of the time the belt does not actually snap. What happens is the rubber teath on the belt can get totaly stripped off causing the belt to stop.
14 - losen the tentioner bolt with a 12mm wrench and unscrew it a bit, but dont take it out! You just want to relieve the tention so you can get the belt off.
15- take the belt off, it is quite tight in there so just work it off slowly. Clean up inside sice there is probably little bits of timing belt all over the place, make sure you clean it all real good.
16- OK, now since the belt snapped while the car was running your timing will be right out of whack!! So you have to position the crank gear and cam gear at top dead center. For the cam gear you should see an arrow. Try to turn the cam gear (this is very hard) so that the arrow is pointing up in line with the engine. Now for the crank pully, put back on the 17mm nut and turn the crank with the wrachet untill the keyway notch is pointing up right in line with the cam gear arrow. This must be accurate or else you car will run like shyt or not at all. So now inspect the the markings again and make sure they are in line.
17- OK now it's time to put on your new timing belt!! This can be a pain in the azz and can be very frustrating!! Start from the top and put the belt around the cam gear, making sure the teath in the belt are seated nicely in the gear, then go down making sure to keep the belt tight and place it around the crank gear. Now i must stress that it must be tight in between the two gears. The teath on the belt should fit perfectly, if not then make sure the timing marks (arrow and key way) are in line and rotate to correct. Now place the belt over the oil pump gear, this one will rotate freely so just rotate it for best tightfit. Now the hard part, you have to pry the timing belt over the tentioner. This will take some time, patience and some muscle. The tentioner is held on by the 12mm bolt, keep this in place to make sure the tentioner does not fall of its mount. There is a spring that keeps the tention and is a pain in the ass to put back on if it falls out. This all must be in place when pulling the timing belt over the tentioner. I find this works best by getting under the car with a flat head screw driver in hand. Take the screw driver and try to pry the tentioner over to give you enuf space to slip the belt over. This will no doupt take you a few goes, give you some nicks and scrapes and cause you to shout profanities (I know i fukin did!!).
18- Ok so now that the tming belt is on and your knucles are bluddy, you can get your 12mm wrench and tighten down the tentioner bolt.
19- Time for one last check, take your 17mm wrachet and rotate the motor in a counter clockwise direction untill the cam gear goes aound 360'. Line the cam gear arrow up in line with the motor and check to see if the crank gear is right in line with it. If it is Congratulations!!!! You just sucessfully replaced your timing belt. If not, your knuckles are gonna have to take more abuse because you will have to take the belt off, allign the timing marks and put the belt back on then rotate the motor again to see if you were sucsessful.
20- Clean up your main timing cover and the gasket that was on there. Place the gasket on to the cover and put back the timing cover to the correct position. I chucked out the two little seals for the tentioner bolt and motor mount because they were a pain in the ass to deal with. Put back all of the 10mm bolts. Place the keyway on to the crank gear and slide on the crank pully. Now get your helper to stand on the brake again while in 5th gear and so you can tighten the 17mm pully bolt down nice good and tight. Put back your belt(s) and top timing cover. Clean up the valve cover gasket with some degreaser as well as around the head and valve cover. Place the gasket into the valve cover and put back the cover and bolt her down. I like to use some high heat silicon on the valve cover seal, it makes for a leak free seal. Now reach down and allign the motor mount to the correct postion and put back the three bolts holding it together. You may have to minipulate engine hight with the jack so you can bolt it together.
Done!!!!!! I hope this all made sense and helped you on your way. Pheww
Try to find a Helms manual (not Haynes I have one and it sucks) or a Honda Service manual.
The hardest part is getting of the bolt that holds on the crank pully, once you have that off the rest is cake, so I would suggest that you try that first before you go any further since you can not take off the timing cover without taking off the pully first.
1- jack up the front drivers side of the car at a minimum or the whole front end if you like and make sure you use jack stands and not just a jack for safety.
2- take off the front drivers side wheel (unless you live in Australia or England then it would be the passenger side) or left front wheel if you will.
3- in the back of the wheel well there is a plastic plug that allows you access to the engine bay right where the main crank pully bolt is.
now this where you ay want to stop. Are you sure that the timing belt is broken??? here is how you can tell for sure:
Take off your valve cover, there are three 10mm bolts across the top holding it on. The cover may be stuck on there pretty good so you may have to pry it off with a screw driver but be careful not to damage the head in the process by scratching the valve cover to head surface or else you may run into a leak later on. Then take off the top timing cover, there is one 10mm bolt on each side. Now you should be able to see the cam timing gear and timing belt. Now get your ratchet with a long extension and a 17mm end and put your car into neutral. Now put the 17mm end through the whole in the wheel well and on to the pully nut. Turn the nut in a counter clockwise direction, this will turn the whole bottom end of the motor, since that bolt is directly connected to the crank and bottom timing gear. As you are turning the motor, you should see the cam gear turn as well, if not, you have a broken timing belt. If it does turn, you have something else wrong with your car.
Ok now that you have determined that you definitely have a broken timing belt you may proceed.
4- ok you are going to need a friend for this one if you have a manual 5spd lude. Put the lude in 5th gear. Have your helper stand on the brake as hard as he can. This will prevent the motor from turning when you try to "break" the crank pully nut.
5- now try to undo the crank pully nut in the normal counter clockwise direction, if you have an impact gun this should not be a problem since an impact gun will usually do the job of breaking it loose. If not this is where the not so fun part is. Take your ratchet (1/2 inch drive is best but a 3/4 could work just not as strong) and the longest extension you have or many together. Now place the ratchet 17mm end onto the nut and grab yourself another jack stand or log or something to support the ratchet extensions and ratchet. You need this since you will be jumping on the ratchet to try and break loose the crank pully bolt. Hopefully you have enough extension so that the ratchet end can reach the 17mm bolt and still have the ratchet handle outside the wheel well with the jack stand supporting it. I hope this makes sense because I am having a hard time explaining it.
6- find your self a long bar or something that will fit over the ratchet handle and give you some leverage. Now jump on the bar and try to break loose the nut (counter clockwise) this may take some time and can be really frustrating, JUST DONT STRIP THE CRAK PULLY NUT!!! If you do then your hooped, that is why you have to support the ratchet perfectly in line with the nut with the jack stand or whatever. It is helpful to have another helper hold the ratchet in place so it does not slip while your giving her hell jumping up and down. When it breaks loose, give a nice sigh of relief and take a break. Leave the bolt in place, don't actually remove it until later.
I just like to do this first because it is the hardest part and some people can't break it loose and have to tow it to a mechanic to take out the bolt and then tow it home again to finish the job. Just keep at it and you'll get it, trust me!! I'm gonna scan the pages now and finish this how to later.
Ok, so you got the bolt off ok?? I have tried to upload the pages but the files are too big, the page says a max of 2Meg but the pages are 6Meg each (2 pages). I don't want to make them any smaller or else you may not be able to read the text. If you have an e-mail that i can send them too, that would work.
7- remove alternator belt. I hope you don't have pwr steering of AC, i don't know how that interfears with the removal of the main timing cover since i have never worked on a PS or AC 2g lude, if you do, you must remove the accessory belt and you might have to unbolt the ac compressor and Pwr steering pump, just look and see if it is in the way of the timing cover.
8- Now that the belt (or belts) are off you can take off the main crank pully. So remove the bolt. When you take the bolt off you will see that the pully is held in place by a little metal key. the pully just slides off and may take some working to get off. VERY IMPORTANT: as you slide off the pully keep track of the little metal key and DO NOT LOOSE IT. It may fall inside the timing cover when you slip off the pully, thats OK you can retreive it when the cover comes off. What you can do is rotate the crank pully with the wrachet so that the key is on top, that way it has less chance of falling somewhere when you slide off the pully.
9- get yourself some sort of tray and put the crank pully key and any bolts you have removed on to it and keep it out of the way, you don't want anything to go missing, especially the key!!!!
10- with a 10mm wrench or wrachet remove all of the bolts holding on the main timing cover. Put all bolts on your tray.
11- Ok, now get your jack and a small piece of ply wood or two by four. Place the jack under the oil pan with the wood so you don't dent or break anything. Put up the jack so that it is snug aginst the oil pan. You have to do this because we are going to remove one engine mount and you will need to support the motor.
12- Dissconnect the left side engine mount. It is held together by 3 bolts they are about 14mm if i remember correctly, one through the cassis and two through the motor. Take all three bolts out and take care to remember wher they go, the chassis bolt is a bit different, place them on your tray. OK, now that the bolts are out, slide the mount towards the chassis (away from the motor) towards you and leave it there, don't actually take it out, we just need it out of the way. If it is too tight to move, lower the jack that is supporting the engine to give you the space.
13- Take out the timing cover. It may be a bit of a bitch to wiggle out, you can lower or rais the motor with the jack to give you the space you need. Also there could be a couple of rubber seals that hinder things a bit. One round one that seals off the tentioner bolt and one rectangular one where the engine mount is. Just reaf on the cover so they slip over the tentioner nut and/or engine mount. Also find the pully key if you dropped it inside the cover while takeing off the pully.
OK so your %40 done, you should see the timing belt and where the failure occered. Most of the time the belt does not actually snap. What happens is the rubber teath on the belt can get totaly stripped off causing the belt to stop.
14 - losen the tentioner bolt with a 12mm wrench and unscrew it a bit, but dont take it out! You just want to relieve the tention so you can get the belt off.
15- take the belt off, it is quite tight in there so just work it off slowly. Clean up inside sice there is probably little bits of timing belt all over the place, make sure you clean it all real good.
16- OK, now since the belt snapped while the car was running your timing will be right out of whack!! So you have to position the crank gear and cam gear at top dead center. For the cam gear you should see an arrow. Try to turn the cam gear (this is very hard) so that the arrow is pointing up in line with the engine. Now for the crank pully, put back on the 17mm nut and turn the crank with the wrachet untill the keyway notch is pointing up right in line with the cam gear arrow. This must be accurate or else you car will run like shyt or not at all. So now inspect the the markings again and make sure they are in line.
17- OK now it's time to put on your new timing belt!! This can be a pain in the azz and can be very frustrating!! Start from the top and put the belt around the cam gear, making sure the teath in the belt are seated nicely in the gear, then go down making sure to keep the belt tight and place it around the crank gear. Now i must stress that it must be tight in between the two gears. The teath on the belt should fit perfectly, if not then make sure the timing marks (arrow and key way) are in line and rotate to correct. Now place the belt over the oil pump gear, this one will rotate freely so just rotate it for best tightfit. Now the hard part, you have to pry the timing belt over the tentioner. This will take some time, patience and some muscle. The tentioner is held on by the 12mm bolt, keep this in place to make sure the tentioner does not fall of its mount. There is a spring that keeps the tention and is a pain in the ass to put back on if it falls out. This all must be in place when pulling the timing belt over the tentioner. I find this works best by getting under the car with a flat head screw driver in hand. Take the screw driver and try to pry the tentioner over to give you enuf space to slip the belt over. This will no doupt take you a few goes, give you some nicks and scrapes and cause you to shout profanities (I know i fukin did!!).
18- Ok so now that the tming belt is on and your knucles are bluddy, you can get your 12mm wrench and tighten down the tentioner bolt.
19- Time for one last check, take your 17mm wrachet and rotate the motor in a counter clockwise direction untill the cam gear goes aound 360'. Line the cam gear arrow up in line with the motor and check to see if the crank gear is right in line with it. If it is Congratulations!!!! You just sucessfully replaced your timing belt. If not, your knuckles are gonna have to take more abuse because you will have to take the belt off, allign the timing marks and put the belt back on then rotate the motor again to see if you were sucsessful.
20- Clean up your main timing cover and the gasket that was on there. Place the gasket on to the cover and put back the timing cover to the correct position. I chucked out the two little seals for the tentioner bolt and motor mount because they were a pain in the ass to deal with. Put back all of the 10mm bolts. Place the keyway on to the crank gear and slide on the crank pully. Now get your helper to stand on the brake again while in 5th gear and so you can tighten the 17mm pully bolt down nice good and tight. Put back your belt(s) and top timing cover. Clean up the valve cover gasket with some degreaser as well as around the head and valve cover. Place the gasket into the valve cover and put back the cover and bolt her down. I like to use some high heat silicon on the valve cover seal, it makes for a leak free seal. Now reach down and allign the motor mount to the correct postion and put back the three bolts holding it together. You may have to minipulate engine hight with the jack so you can bolt it together.
Done!!!!!! I hope this all made sense and helped you on your way. Pheww
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