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Timing belts. Are they suppose to be this tight?


peppermiller
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Morning all. 

Timing belt day 3, this damn car has been fighting me all the way! Starting to think think it was a bad idea but no going back now. 

Based on advice I went for a complete Gates kit. Water pump went on no problems and tightened it the correct way. Then I get to the timing belt itself and I can't for the life of me get the damn thing on!? I'm starting from the non tension side and working the belt around, right to left if you like but the problem is it just won't slip onto the tensioner even when it's at it's slackest point, probably 3mm out? I've tried twisting it on, I've tried slipping it onto the fuel pump and water pump but still no bueno. The belt is correct and has 144 teeth for the model with AC. 

Can anyone suggest anything else I can try. Don't fancy levering it on as someone's suggested for fear of damaging the belt or something else. 

I've exhausted my catalogue of swear words on this damn car, so to the internet for some more exotic variations.

If anyone here has done it before PLEASE drop by and let me know what witchcraft you used.

Thanks. Pippa

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Which engine?  And have you checked it's the same length as the one you took off? 

They are reasonably tight and it can be best to slip a few mm onto each cog working round rather than fully fitting one cog first.  Also, are you sure the tensioner is fitted correctly?

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12 hours ago, TomsFocus said:

Which engine?  And have you checked it's the same length as the one you took off? 

They are reasonably tight and it can be best to slip a few mm onto each cog working round rather than fully fitting one cog first.  Also, are you sure the tensioner is fitted correctly?

Should have mentioned, it's the 1.4tdci. on a 53 plate. Yes the belt is the same length with the correct amount of teeth and the tensioner is located on it's peg. Had a local mobile mechanic here today - he spent just over an hour on it and got no further. Said that new belts can be extremely tight and that's manufactured in to help not ruin an engine if say the tensioner becomes slightly slacker than it should be. Sounds plausible but I don't know? 

Anyway, the suggestion was to call Gates in the morning and ask if there has been any manufacturing defects on my particular kit? Haven't done a great deals of timing belts but this one is way out in front as being the most difficult. ***** cars!!

 

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10 hours ago, peppermiller said:

Should have mentioned, it's the 1.4tdci. on a 53 plate. Yes the belt is the same length with the correct amount of teeth and the tensioner is located on it's peg. Had a local mobile mechanic here today - he spent just over an hour on it and got no further. Said that new belts can be extremely tight and that's manufactured in to help not ruin an engine if say the tensioner becomes slightly slacker than it should be. Sounds plausible but I don't know? 

Anyway, the suggestion was to call Gates in the morning and ask if there has been any manufacturing defects on my particular kit? Haven't done a great deals of timing belts but this one is way out in front as being the most difficult. ***** cars!!

 

The 1.4/1.6 TDCi are usually about the easiest belts you can do on modern engines.  Only one cam sprocket, a keyed crank pulley and not bathed in oil.

Have you pulled the pin out of the tensioner?  If the belt is the same length it must be the tensioner that's wrong somehow.  Unless the waterpump pulley is the wrong size maybe, might be worth checking that against the old one if haven't already.  Not convinced about belts being manufactured too tight, the tensioner is sprung to automatically take out any slack.

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  • 1 month later...
On 6/12/2021 at 9:12 AM, TomsFocus said:

The 1.4/1.6 TDCi are usually about the easiest belts you can do on modern engines.  Only one cam sprocket, a keyed crank pulley and not bathed in oil.

Have you pulled the pin out of the tensioner?  If the belt is the same length it must be the tensioner that's wrong somehow.  Unless the waterpump pulley is the wrong size maybe, might be worth checking that against the old one if haven't already.  Not convinced about belts being manufactured too tight, the tensioner is sprung to automatically take out any slack.

It's finally done!! Finished it about 2 hours ago. What an expensive nightmare, took the mechanic and his assistant 2 hours to force the belt over the tensioner while my brother held the belt on the cam and me on the crank pulley. Charged me £225 for the pleasure which I thought was robbery, but it's done!

Never again...

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  • 2 years later...

I've just had this same issue on my 1.5 TDCi. Even with tensioner fully slacked off and with tensioner spring lock pin in place, the new belt was way too tight to fit  without Special Measures, In the end i cracked it by using the fuel lpump pulley as a kind of capstan, winding it clockwise to move the belt a tooth at a time clockwise over the camshaft sprocket until if finally fitted under the RH idler pulley. The only trouble with this is that now the fuel pump pulley is out of alighment, having moved clockwise past its locking pin position. Does this matter? And if so, what should i do about it?. Haven't tensioned the belt yet so there''s probably enough slaick to move the fuel pump pulley back anticlockwise to reinsert locking pin before final tensioning and torquing up Talking of which, i tried to tighten crankshaft pullley to 26 ft lbs plus 190 degrees, but couldn't move it much more than 45-60 degrees of added angle, even using my longest drive handle, Again, does that matter? 

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Hi, I have done this job this year, but my kit came with a new timing belt tensioner. Fit the tensioner so that stub on the engine block is central in the forked end of the tensioner back plate. Make sure the roller is pinned back while you fit the new belt around it, and release the spring loading once the belt is in position. Fit the new belt working anti clockwise from the crankshaft pulley up to the camshaft pulley, then down to the water pump, keep it tight as you go, and make sure that the two holes in the fuel pump pulley are vertically aligned. Good luck!

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