Bad vibration after changing timing & balancer belts

[panther4417]

I have a 2000 Accord with a 2.3L 4 cylinder and manual transmission. I just changed the timing belt, balancer belt, water pump, tensioner wheels and other external belts. I now get a bad engine vibration at idle and when backing up and pulling forward. The vibration is quite noticeable in the steering wheel. Reving the engine smooths it out at certain RPM's. I know this isn't right and its got to be limited to something I just did. I followed the instructions in the Honda service manual and thought that everything went back to gether correctly. I double checked the timing and balancer alignments. The motor mount on the drivers side is simple and all went back together correctly. Does anyone have any ideas on what the problem could be? Is there a way to verify correct timing belt and balancer belt alignments without tearing it all down again? I would greatly appreciate any help.

[AccordCodger]

Well ---- I had the same problem after the shop did that job for me. But I convinced myself that it was the motor mounts (specifically the one closes to the firewall -- called the "left" one). The mileage on my car was pretty high, and I suspect that taking the load off the front mount (the one on the driver's side) may have given the "kiss of death" to the other mount.

I had the shop replace the mount (the "left" one) and that fixed the vibration.

[Huffa]

Oh man, I hope you don't have to tear it all down again!

Maybe the balancer belt is too tight...I really don't know?

At this very moment I'm contemplating on doing the same job on my 91 SE. I got the Honda shop service manual for it.

Maybe you can answer a ? for me?

How did you get the crank pulley BOLT off???? Thats my BIGGEST worry, that is until you posted having a problem when done and thought you did everything right.

I know you can make or buy a lock down tool so the pulley wont rotate but what tool (impact, breaker bar??) did you use to break that 160 ft-lb bolt loose?????

Hope you find your problem & I sympathize with ya man!!!

-Huffa

[panther4417]

Originally Posted by Huffa

Oh man, I hope you don't have to tear it all down again!

Maybe the balancer belt is too tight...I really don't know?

At this very moment I'm contemplating on doing the same job on my 91 SE. I got the Honda shop service manual for it.

Maybe you can answer a ? for me?

How did you get the crank pulley BOLT off???? Thats my BIGGEST worry, that is until you posted having a problem when done and thought you did everything right.

I know you can make or buy a lock down tool so the pulley wont rotate but what tool (impact, breaker bar??) did you use to break that 160 ft-lb bolt loose?????

Hope you find your problem & I sympathize with ya man!!!

-Huffa

I got the crankshaft pulley bolt off by using a 1/2-inch drive 6-pt 19mm impact-strength socket on the bolt, a 24-inch 1/2-inch drive extension to get outside of the fender, a 2-ft 1/2-inch drive breaker bar with a 5-ft pipe on it, and a large heavy wooden stool as a fulcrum. The car has a manual trans so my wife got in, put it in 5th and put the brakes on while on reefed on the sucker. My neighbor waited outside of the garage until he heard the big snap sound. I wasn't sure if I broke the bolt loose or broke one of the tools. Fortunately it was the bolt that broke loose. I read an earlier post from someone who said to only use 3/4-inch drive tools. I called all over on Saturday and couldn't find much of anything in 3/4-inch drive. I figured the 1/2-inch stuff was cheap enough that if it doesn't work I'm out just a few bucks. The guys at AutoZone said 1/2-drive is ususally all it takes. Maybe I lucked out. Since I have a manual trans, I didn't bother trying to get a hold of the pulley holder tool in the Honda manual. If you have an automatic you will probably need it along with a long pipe on it to counter the leverage you will use to break the bolt loose. I also found out it is not necessary to remove all of the plastic underneath nor the passenger's side tire. You can pull just enough of the driver's side wheel well plastic out of the way to gain the necessary access.

As for my vibration, I just tore enough down to verify that the timing belt is correctly positioned as well as the balancer belt. I'm not sure what to do next. I find it hard to belive that a bad motor mount would cause the kind of vibration that I'm getting. I still suspect the balancer belt positioning because I don't full understand what is going on with it and an earlier post mentioned a similar problem where the balancer was a rotation off. I would like to know how it is possible for one of the balancers to be off by one rotation. When I position the front balancer shaft marks at 12-oclock, there are four positions of the rear balancer gear that cause the alignment screw to move in far enough.

I don't know what to do. Right now I feel so screwed. I'm going to sleep on it and hope something comes to mind. I'm also going to look at the other motor mounts just for good measure. I would be suprised if it turns out the vibration is caused by a bad mount.

Good luck with your repair.

[panther4417]

Originally Posted by panther4417

I have a 2000 Accord with a 2.3L 4 cylinder and manual transmission. I just changed the timing belt, balancer belt, water pump, tensioner wheels and other external belts. I now get a bad engine vibration at idle and when backing up and pulling forward. The vibration is quite noticeable in the steering wheel. Reving the engine smooths it out at certain RPM's. I know this isn't right and its got to be limited to something I just did. I followed the instructions in the Honda service manual and thought that everything went back to gether correctly. I double checked the timing and balancer alignments. The motor mount on the drivers side is simple and all went back together correctly. Does anyone have any ideas on what the problem could be? Is there a way to verify correct timing belt and balancer belt alignments without tearing it all down again? I would greatly appreciate any help.

I found the problem. I did not have the balancer pulleys positioned correctly with respect to the crankshaft. I missed the step where I was supposed to have the crankshaft at TDC before aligning the balancer pulleys. I don't know why I didn't think of that sooner. After realigning everything and putting it all back together, the engine now purrs.

I now have a new problem that I think might be a motor mount. I'm getting vibration when I start the engine or turn it off. I also get vibration when downshifting or backing up. Anyone else have this experience after changing a timing belt? Any suggestions welcome.

[Huffa]

Glad to hear you fixed it!

I just changed the front mount (called torque rod actually) by radiator days ago, as mine was KAPUT!!

The rubber was seperated and cracked. I noticed I had to preload it somewhat to the right postion at top by jacking up the motor slightly. I scribed a line on the bracket so I knew right where to put the new one. There is room for leway by about a 1/2 " up and down in bolt slot.

Surprised me how just the front one calmed the vibration down.

The rear motor mounts go on these too and I have one I won from ebay but didn't receive it yet..

You had to have the L side one off to do the belt...Is that correct? Is there room for adjustment on that one also? Maybe it's just not "tensioned" right???

GEEEZ, almost forgot to thank you for the info you gave me!

THANKS!!!!

-Huffa

[gunnmen01]

i was just gonna tell you to recheck the balancer belt... they are so easy to get lined up wrong.......... glad you got it fixed though


gunnmen01

[panther4417]

Originally Posted by panther4417

I found the problem. I did not have the balancer pulleys positioned correctly with respect to the crankshaft. I missed the step where I was supposed to have the crankshaft at TDC before aligning the balancer pulleys. I don't know why I didn't think of that sooner. After realigning everything and putting it all back together, the engine now purrs.

I now have a new problem that I think might be a motor mount. I'm getting vibration when I start the engine or turn it off. I also get vibration when downshifting or backing up. Anyone else have this experience after changing a timing belt? Any suggestions welcome.

I fixed the second vibration problem. I had the front (driver's side) engine mount too tight. I loosened it up an re-torqued it to 22 N-m and and the vibration went away. I think by having it too tight it was transfering the vibration right through to the body.

[abhayk]

I got the timing belt/other belts changed since i bought this car at 105K miles and looks like i opened a can of worms. I've changed the plugs to NGK, the repair shop did a free injector cleaning, checked the balancer and belt to see if anything was out of whack, mounts are good but the car still vibrates badly at 1100 rpm. the bad part is that the pickup also sucks. its an I4 VTEC on my 1999 Honda Accord EX. surprisingly there wasn't this vibration at all before the timing belt service. also, when i stop at a stop sign/light, the car revvs up a notch and comes back to 750 RPM. am sure that's not normal. any suggestion? the guy has given up and recommended to go to a dealer. heck the funny thing is he's been a honda tech for over 10 years himself. i'd appreciate if anyone can help me in this regard.

[AccordCodger]

I'm starting to sound like a cracked record (remember those?) but it MIGHT be a motor mount problem. You say the mounts are OK, but how do you know? Replacing timing belts requires one motor mount to be unbolted, right? So the "settle" of the motor on its mounts is disturbed.

I had a similar problem after the shop changed timing belts, and a new left motor mount fixed it.

[panther4417]

Originally Posted by abhayk

I got the timing belt/other belts changed since i bought this car at 105K miles and looks like i opened a can of worms. I've changed the plugs to NGK, the repair shop did a free injector cleaning, checked the balancer and belt to see if anything was out of whack, mounts are good but the car still vibrates badly at 1100 rpm. the bad part is that the pickup also sucks. its an I4 VTEC on my 1999 Honda Accord EX. surprisingly there wasn't this vibration at all before the timing belt service. also, when i stop at a stop sign/light, the car revvs up a notch and comes back to 750 RPM. am sure that's not normal. any suggestion? the guy has given up and recommended to go to a dealer. heck the funny thing is he's been a honda tech for over 10 years himself. i'd appreciate if anyone can help me in this regard.

I noticed the wandering RPM problem the first time I started the engine after changing the timing belt and balancer belt. I had severe vibration in the steering wheel and elsewhere to go with it. This was all due to the new balancer belt not being positioned correctly with respect to the crankshaft. I didn't have the crank at TDC when I positioned the balancer belt. After I fixed this, the engine smoothed right out perfectly without wandering. I still had a minor vibration when I would start and stop the engine. This was due to the front (driver's side) motor mount being too tight.

If I were you, I would loosen the nut of the front motor mount rubber piece and just see what that does to vibration. This is easy to do and can be informative. If it doesn't improve anything then tighten it back up to 22 N-m (and not any more) and inspect the rest of the motor mounts. My Accord has a manual transmisson and all of the motor mounts are just simple rubber pieces encapsulated by heavy metal. I understand the automatic transmission versions have an active left (firewall) mount that is vulnerable. I don't know what to look for with it. If all of the mounts look good (i.e. lots of rubber left that holds the floating enging bolt near the center) then suspect the balancer belt.

Checking the balancer belt for correct position and tension requires a fair amount of work. You have to jack up the driver's side, remove the valve cover and upper timing belt cover at a minimum. You will also need to insert a bolt into the balancer shaft maintenance hole in the back of the engine. This is all stuff that is explained in the factory service manual. Since this is all fresh in my mind, I could probably do it within half an hour. If you are not mechanically inclinded, you will need to find a reputable mechanic that can check it out.

I hope this is of some help to you. Reply if you have any further questions.

[abhayk]

Thanks a zillion guys for the quick reply atleast. the Mechanic i went to has worked on Hondas for over a decade and is a pretty honest guy. maybe that's his downfall. he said that the mounts are good. i haven't seen them and don't know whether they are black, white or green. i ahve a hunch too that the mounts could be an issue. but noticed one creepy thing too, maybe unrelated, that when i bring the car to a stop, the rpm goes down to idle (750 rpm) and then suddenly there is a spike in RPM to about 1000 and back. not a big one. this used to happen on my Passat until i found that the Mass airflow sensor had conked off. VW gave me a free replacement of course but I hope its not the case here. i am guessing that the car is trying to re-caliberate the variable valve timing with this new setup. well, will probably take it to a honda guy for the mounts and get a good analysis. in the meanwhile if anyone comes up with any other suggestions, they are most welcome.
thanks once again.

[abhayk]

I think the gremlin got caught. I took the car to a Honda dealership and bugged all the techs there who were unanimous in their decision that it was the balancer shaft out of whack by a tooth or two. took the car back to the mech who did it and told them that i'll take the car back only when they do the work fine this time. also asked him to change the pump no matter what. imagine he hadn't done that b4!! anyway, looks like my subtle threat worked and now that vibration at 1100 rpm is gone. the car has some basic vibrations but that's what hondas are known for i guess. they are not as smooth as camrys, at least the 1999 models. anyway, my conclusion, unless you know what your mech is doing and you can supply all the OEM parts, take it to a dealer even if it sucks. simply becoz if the dealer screws up, you can hold them by their %@##$ up thru the ladder till the company or whatever. i have ultimately ended up paying what the dealership would have charged anyway. makes me feel like a sucker, but i learnt my lesson. btw, anyone thinking of using synthetic on their cars, I've got it on my Passat and the engine has quitened a hell lot.

[spydercatt]

http://youtu.be/9TMR9PG3fko