Putting the Belt back on

What is the easiest and most effective way to put the timing belt back on? I got the old one off but I'm having great difficulty in putting the new one on. So any thoughts on this would be great.

did you swing the idler all the way back and tighten the bolt to hold it there?

If your talking about the tensioner than yes I did. I don't know anything about an idler being in that area.

It can be a Some Beach. I think some models have a belt with square teeth and some with rounded ones. Be sure you have the same on your replacement. Try first putting the belt only partially on the crank pulley. Keep the front of the car side tight. Then partially on the cam pulley. Then deflect the back side in front of the idler/tensioner. Then push the belt completely on both pulleys.

Why did they make two different belts? Wouldn't it have been easier to make one or even a universal one that would work on all models. I think that I may have gotten the wrong belt because the teeth aren't lining up with the gears. So I'll be going back to the parts store and getting the right one this time.

look at old belt and see if it has round teeth or square ones and get one to match

My best guess is that the belt I need is the one with the square teeth. Also I have the belt with the round teeth and it doesn't fit. The only reason that it's a guess is because the old belt was completely shredded and there were no teeth remaining. When I was cleaning up the area I was picking belt pieces off of everything.

Those belts can be very tight, you might have the correct one. What I do is put it on the crank first, then try and get it about 1/4 of the way on the cam. Then rotate the crank with a big wrench and the belt will slowely go onto the cam.

if your crank is a 4 bolt you have one type of belt, if you have a 5 bolt crank you have a differnt type of belt. The 4 bolt was the older of the two.

The parts guy should have asked you if you had a 4 or 5 bolt crank!

What crank do you have? And what belt do you happen to use on it?

Both of my metros are the 4 bolt crank. The belts were both really tight to get on, but once on, the belt fits just fine. I think it was sometime in 93 when they went from 4 bolt to 5 bolt crank. If you look at some of the online parts places like rockauto.com they don't ask if you have a 4 or 5 bolt crank until the 93 model year. Just count the number of bolts in your crank (the ones that you had a hard time removing).

most of the time the 4 bolt belts parts number end in the numbers 166 and most of the time the 5 bolt crank blets end in the numbers 241

If you have the correct belt, use my method above to get it on. Once on, rotate the crank a couple of times. Then make sure that both timing marks (crank and cam) are both at 12 oclock at that same time. You will have to rotate at least twice cause the crank pully turns twice for every time the cam pully turns once. Then tighten down the tensioner bolt.

Rotating the crank clockwise will also take any slack out of the belt before you tighten down the tensioner bolt,

Also, you might want to post pics of what you are doing. We are here to help and pics are very helpful. Also a simple thank you helps us out too!

I'd have no problem posting pictures soon as I figured out how. Also thanks to all who have given their ideas so that I could fix my problem.

I'd have no problem posting pictures soon as I figured out how...

Snap your pictures, then make a Photobucket (http://www.photobucket.com) account. Upload your photos to your photobucket album, then post the IMG link into the text box.

-MechanicMatt