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The power steering was out and the timing belt hasn't been changed for as long as I owned the car when the water pump quit. The person I bought the car from said he didn't remember ever changing the timing belt and he was the original owner. The estimate to fix the power steering, the water pump, and to change the timing belt was around $900 and that still left two bad tires.

I felt the van was only worth about $1500 even fixed so I used the opportunity to buy a 92 Honda Accord wit 90,000 miles and 25 mpg for $2800 and get some better gas mileage.

After I bought the Honda, I was faced with spending $900 to sell a $1500 car or possibly hauling an otherwise perfectly good van to the junkyard.

It has been a long time since I did major work on my own cars but I thought I would use the opportunity to teach my 17 year old son something about cars.

I expected the timing belt to be in tatters when i broke it down but when the timing belt cover came off, the belt appears to be in fine shape. I still haven't put it back together and am debating changing the belt anyway. What concerns me is my ability to properly tension it. The book says to apply 22 pounds pressure and measure the deflection to be 0.51 to 0.59 inches. Too little and it slips, too much and you wear out a cam shaft bearing.

I seriously doubt that I have the tools or skill to acheive that kind of tolerance. At least the existing belt appears good but I have read other web sites that say the belt can look fine but still be ready to internally break. I don't know how much weight to give that and I also don't know just how critical the 0.51 to 0.59 tolerance is.

I would like to change the belt just to walk my son through it but even though I am going to sell the car I don't want to hand the next owner a car with an improperly tensioned timing belt that will wear out his camshaft bearing.

I am out of town until tuesday but I have to decide what to do by then.

What's your thoughts.

Thanks
Tom Ryan