Whatever happened to Timing CHAINS.....these Belts are a BIG pain in the ****....espacially if you have a Interference Engine...which these cars have.

I guess almost all cars have a Timing Belt instead of a chain except for the VW Passat, which has a chain.

I'm thinking maybe CASH Flow is a good answer....[sm=badbadbad.gif]

 

big time are they a pain in the behind. my car in england had a belt which snapped thankfully at low speed, only bent a couple of valves.

now i also have a 2001 cavalier z24, that has a chain, 230,000 km on it and i have yet to change it.

 

no, all nissan V6 engines 95+ have chains, i think later I4 engines got chains too, and their V8's have chains as well

a chain never needs to be adjusted or replaced theoretically, but there are still problems with them, for example tensioners can get worn down and make lots of noise needing replacement, start up noise in the cold especially can be heard on older engines with chains, if the chain goes its probably cheaper to get a new motor than repair the damage it causes...

there are pluses and minuses, there was a post here some time ago that i have read which explained the benefits of a belt over a chain, i may try to find it later for reference sake...

i would still prefer a chain over a timing belt simply because its metal vs rubber and rubber will always loose in this case, you see this on prematurely cracked belts which dry up due to the heat generated by the engine and being in such close proximity to it, unlike an oil lubricated chain

 

S80 timing belt change is better than my other car's belt to replace...

 

I am going to finally chime in here.

In my opinion I would rather stick with the belts.

On the Mustangs the pulleys wear thin by about 90K and get noisy and the chain is really loose.

I have seen many car company's that still have the chains in them but they use plastic guides that the chains run on and by 100K the guides are ate up and the chain will eventually jump and bend valves.

Alot of the ones I have seen that were so bad they jumped were all Chevy motors. But there was others out there using the same setup.

Also when doing the belt it is a ton easier to replace than the timing chain.

 

No doubt...

 

I just wonder why they couldn't design the pistons with a 'scallop' where the valves hit when a belt breaks i.e. so that the engines would not be interference fit. Any compression loss cold be made up be adding material to the head to maintain the same compression ration.