I have a great wife. We have agreed that when the "rally" as she calls it, needs something done, that it will be done with hi performance upgrades. I'm coming up on the 60k mark soon and know that it is time for a timing belt. What I need help with, is what else can I do with it that all totalled will about equal the dealer price on doing a timing belt. (I cant remember xactly how much that is but lets say $500)

I first thought stage 2 cam, but the only one I have found is the RRM part that runs $600 by itself. (kinda hi for a 4cyl cam if u ask me)

So what else could be done keeping inline with the timing belt that will stay in the $500 range?

 

I would say nothing lol.

Here is my opinon on the matter.

Dont do the timing belt yet. Do it at 100k
My bud who owns a RA did his at around 80k and the belt looked perfect. I just did mine last weekend and it looked identical to his. Difference is that im around 125k....
The parts i got with my belt cost me around 320 ish. I got pulleys,tensioners and belt. I did NOT get a water pump. My reasoning for this is this. I had enough to do the belt,pulleys,water pump just not both. My train of thought was this. If my water pump goes out i have an over heating problem. If my pulleys give out i have an engine dying problem.
An those price figures were me installing it myself. If you have someone do it it would be considerably more. Just food for thought.

 

I just did mine at 80k and ALL the belts were PERFECT. And I've spent a LOT of time at redline. haha

So yeah. Wait til 100k unless your belt is way off center like mine. I watched it go back and forth on the cam and it was causing vibrating, and since I had them off I ended up replacing them anyways.

 

I don't recommend waiting until 100k. The belt isn't the only, nor the most likely, failure point. The timing belt tensioner is the part most likely to fail. Also, the belt might look okay (no cracks or fraying) but it is stretched and the material inside the belt is under stress.

 

Interesting difference of opinion's

I'm glad I got mine done, buuuuuuut maybe I could have waited?

 

ATM i dont think there's anything you could get with that price range that can be done while the timing belt is out unless you want to go and get an RRM pulley and do the serpentine belt while you're at it...

 

Yeah... I wouldn't recommend waiting till 100k either. I've got about 100k on my car and my timing belt broke while going about 80 MPH down the highway. I haven't had a chance to really take a look at it yet because I was in the process of moving a quarter of the way across the country. Hopefully its not too bad...

I'm beginning to think my car is cursed... Two transmission failures and a broken timing belt in 6 months.

 

I did mine last weekend at 100K KILOMETERS, so that's about 62K miles. Everything "looked" perfect, the belt, the pully & the hydraulic tensioner (that also had a lot of adjusting range to go)......anyway as Otter said, there may be failures that you can't see. The consequence of a broken T-belt may be nasty so I just went with the owner's manual recomendation (96k kms). The accesory drive belt I didn't change, but if it breaks I'ts not a big deal.....the T-belt is. There are some thigs I rather be on the safe side.